


Where Song Lies Still

by Seebright



Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: Additional Warnings On Chapter-By-Chapter Basis, Angst, But Also Heavy On The Comfort, But Boy Do They Have A Hard Time Getting There, Canon But Bullied Until It Plays Nice, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Everybody Lives, Excepting Those Who Were Dead Before The Events Of The Game, Fix-It, Fluff, Gen, HEAVY On The Familial Bonding, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Just to be safe, More Angst Than Initially Anticipated, Now We Have Hugs, Occasional Body Horror (Thanks Hollow), Panic Attacks, Sibling Bonding, Slow Build, The AU Is That Ghost Receives Emotional Support And Also Works Out Non-Lethal Plot Devices, Thoughts of Self-harm, Trauma, heavy on the hurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-04-17
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:13:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 32
Words: 141,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22748380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seebright/pseuds/Seebright
Summary: There is a voice in Hallownest, but no one else can hear it.
Relationships: Hornet & The Knight (Hollow Knight), The Hollow Knight | Pure Vessel & The Knight, The Knight & Most Of Hallownest
Comments: 333
Kudos: 584





	1. To Sacrifice Without Understanding

**Author's Note:**

> The Knight hears something important, and takes the plunge. 
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Body horror (Hollow Knight-related), supernatural anxiety attack, what could generously be interpreted as self harm-adjacent
> 
> There's a bit of canon dialogue to kick things off, but we'll quickly move past that into The Development.

The Knight, for that is what they were, stood at the edge. Around them the whine of the cold wind was thick with dust carried in from the wastes, and beneath their claws they could see that the ancient stone of the broken road had every right to be crumbling, laced through with cracks that should the Knight move would shift and grind and, eventually, fail. 

It was a very long drop, one they could see tumbled down those dismal cliffs that precluded the destroyed gate to Hallownest, but they were not afraid of it. They didn’t feel afraid at all, they thought. But the Knight did feel, and for the longest time they hadn’t remembered. The howling, lonesome road had a way of covering such things in a layer of acceptance, resignation lying heavy like dust on the tongue. 

Which was, the Knight thought, maybe a little more poetic than it deserved. And really it was only barely more than an educated guess. They didn’t have a tongue. 

At any rate, they were feeling again and it was strange. It didn’t feel good, exactly, but something in it caught like a serrated hook in their chest. The Knight couldn’t turn away. Which was fine. They had no special attachment for the open road, though they thought they’d liked the sights it led to. 

But on the other hand, that hook had pulled them to Hallownest, of all places. The Knight thought they had a very good memory, which made it all the more unsettling that they couldn’t remember an instant of their past there. They knew they’d come from this kingdom, and they knew that it hadn’t been a pleasant experience, because by the time they’d actually gotten around to forgetting it, they’d been bleeding void from their feet and burning, crumbling with exhaustion, soul reserves bled long dry. 

But that was neither here nor there. This was their last chance. A final opportunity to turn away and forget again and never, never come back. They’d already done it once, when they’d all the memory their short stay here could offer, when they’d known the stakes and understood the cost and still gone. There was something furious here, they could tell, something raging so quietly and insidiously that to face it as they had been would be to blot themself from existence as thoroughly as the sunlight bleaches color from bones.

That is to say, it would hurt.

Already some memory returned to them. But they were unsurprised, because they’d always known that Hallownest was a painful land.

Out beyond the steep cliffs and driving winds scarifying their mask with grains of stone and silt, beyond the dim of the perpetual stasis, they had heard something that made them hurt. Made them feel. The Knight, a wanderer of distant lands for a very, very long time, had heard something that for a moment made them forget the intervening years and remember, just for that moment, where they were from.

Oh, they’d always known they were from Hallownest, and that their birthplace had hurt them dearly, and that now they were alone and, though they could not remember why, the world out here seemed very quiet and lonely and at once horrendously loud. They also knew that they had left for a reason, and that reason was unimportant, because they were alive and intended to stay that way.

They grew and changed and hardened and learned to be kind and to be merciless, but they were not at peace. It was too quiet and too much there to be peaceful, in those shifting places beyond Hallownest’s bounds. They grew strong, but they did not belong there. They lost the bite of emotion and the gnaw of loneliness, but paid for it in restlessness. Nowhere felt right, and no place was restful.

Not that that mattered. They would find themself anywhere at all, and truly they had seen so much that that promise held some weight, so long as they could live through it. The Knight refused, point blank, to allow death.

But here they were, because they’d heard something that sounded like home. After so long so far away they’d grown very used to the outside, away from that which had made them. The uncomfortable shift and shiver of their void, lacking something that it missed, was nearly comforting in its familiarity. It didn’t feel like discomfort anymore. One could get used to anything at all, or so they’d heard. Maybe that was where they went wrong.

Because the sound, it had rung so familiar and so painful that immediately they had stood up and left their campsite to follow it. All they could think of was pain, but in a curious way. It wasn’t their pain, no, they’d been having a pleasant afternoon in a land dense with cool greenery, shading them from the sun, thick with aggressive inhabitants that, while easily provoked, had such soft skins that they fed the Knight their souls with all the difficulty of skimming muck off of a pond. It was thin and watery and trickled away before the Knight could harvest much from each, but there were many and their blade was sharp and strong. One of the nicer days they’d ever had, alone in a forest bursting with life and curious little things to see.

Not the Knight’s pain at all. It was… Sympathetic. Yes, what they heard was not projected so that it hurt them physically like a wound. It was someone else’s entirely. Someone dear to them, though they could not place who. Someone whose pain was akin to their own.

Which was ridiculous. The Knight didn’t think they remembered how to love anymore.

In spite of that they hadn’t hesitated in getting up to leave, without any of their supplies or anything at all of the curiosities and helpful little tools they’d collected from the many lands they’d found and wandered. They weren’t important, and they wouldn’t be helpful where they were going. 

Someone needed them, someone was calling out in desperation, someone hurt so badly that their voice cracked and grated and shrieked. Someone was in mind-wrenching agony, and they had been there for such a long time, and only now did they break and call for aid.

The Knight’s void was still and quiet within their carapace, for their void was what could hear the call, and for once in an age their path was obvious, all the brambles and choices cleared away. Their life out here was over and done. A road they had walked and enjoyed and hated, dully and endlessly, for nearly as long as they’d been alive, but it was finished now. They couldn’t find it in themself to regret the loss. Someone called out to them, and they would answer, because if they didn’t a guilt they couldn’t so much as remember the shape of would eat them alive.

But that was then, and now they were at the precipice. It had taken half a year of drifting to make it to this point by their best reckoning, following the tug of the void within them and, sometimes, hearing the call. A little bit of their first life returned to them with each cry only they could hear. White masks. A held gaze. Held hands. Shaking, afraid, hurt. Blankness, because the climb was unending and their fragile, new carapace would crumple if they continued to feel all the bone under their hands. 

It wasn’t very reassuring, but they’d always known the past hurt. Someone needed them, and if they’d kept calling like this for so long, no one else would answer. _They_ would always answer, the Knight knew, always, but it was disheartening that no one else had come to the Someone’s aid. 

They’d abandoned their blade of sharpened tooth, taken from a great and dead creature lying silent and shedding sickly green ash into the wind. They had followed the long, curving coils of its body ages past to a gaping, circular mouth lined with fangs still needle-sharp. Something pulsed within it, potent with power, but it was alien to the Knight, felt antithesis to their shade and soul, so they’d wrenched a smaller tooth from the creature’s crumbling jaw and used it to arm themself instead.

It had served them well for a long time, but it felt wrong to take it into Hallownest, though the Knight was so distracted at the edge of the kingdom they didn’t think too hard about why. So they left it at the foot of the mountain range and instead picked up the first nail they’d found that was small enough not to be too ungainly. They’d never changed their cloak, though by now it was worn and darkly stained, but here technically within the bounds of the kingdom they were glad for it.

So here they stood. Holding an unfamiliar nail, armed otherwise with only a goal and fleeting, faded memory. They’d spent so long being tactical, methodical, careful, that the ingrained habit if nothing else protested against what they were about to do.

As though that would stop them. Their Someone needed them. The Knight would never regret coming to their aid.

It must have been some time indeed that they’d been standing there, though the sky hadn’t changed and their carapace didn’t creak as they lowered themself into a crouch and launched off of the shattered bridge, down and down to meet the pale little lights of the town they saw in the distance.

They landed easily on their feet and shifted the nail in their hand, placing it at their back, and began walking. 

It wasn’t such a long walk by their standards, but it still took some time, and they didn’t know where exactly Someone was, so they plotted as every step carried them closer to the town and the sealed kingdom. The Knight thought it would be best to go all in for this adventure. They had the oddest impression of standing before a yawning abyss when they looked towards the town in the distance, though they’d already surpassed the cliffs and here the earth was exceptionally flat and level, and exceptionally boring. 

They’d never choose to visit somewhere like this of their own volition. It wasn’t even that it seemed dangerous, there was just nothing there. A handful of abysmal little houses half-consumed by the dust rolling in on the wind off the mountains, maybe a sprinkling of lamps lining the single street they crowded around. 

But, such is fate. If the call led them here, there must be more to the kingdom than meets the eye. 

So in the interest of time, if nothing else, it would be best to make nice with the townsfolk, assuming the dry little town supported anyone at all. A kingdom’s people tended to have insight that couldn’t be gained alone, and they also tended to tell the Knight more than they should, perhaps, when it became clear the Knight wouldn’t be talking back. 

There would also need to be a way into the kingdom proper, but they weren’t so worried about that. Every kingdom, even sealed ones, had their wormholes.

So they padded up through the dust and the dry, shifting earth to greet the first bug they saw. They were old, though not as old as the Knight, and they absorbed his wistful advice absently when he spoke to them. He told them of the dead kingdom and poisonous dreams and mad creatures, and they agreed that it was safer up here in the dying town, not-yet-dead. 

They didn’t move once as they listened carefully, and they noticed when Elderbug began to notice that they did not react like a bug might. They had learned, over the long years, to put up a facsimile of a creature who bore their emotions and thoughts in their physical language, but they’d just as quickly learned that that produced worse results than simply waiting and listening. And usually there was little to express.

But Elderbug seemed to take it in stride, speaking to them like they were a friendly face and a regular person. It was charming. Perhaps he had seen so many strange and cruel travelers, a very small and quiet one didn’t faze him a bit. The Knight was startled by how much they appreciated it of the aged bug, talking to them kindly and without disgust or even overt discomfort. 

Perhaps they could do him a good turn one day.

Elderbug must have noticed their attention waning, because he stopped his musings. “Feeling tired? That bench may be iron, but I assure you it's quite comfortable. There's no better place to collect your thoughts before heading below.” He offered, gesturing to the wrought iron bench beneath a lumafly lamppost. 

“Plus I enjoy the company. Not that you seem the talkative sort.” He chortled, but not with derision. 

The Knight quite liked him, so they took him up on the offer. They were surprised again to find that they _were_ tired, truthfully. They shouldn’t have been, but perhaps their thoughts had been more cluttered than they’d realized. It was a long trek up the mountains, and they were walking a long time before that. They scooted back on the cool metal bench and in moments they were resting.

They couldn’t sleep, not really, and they couldn’t close their eyes, but a quiet, still moment was just as good. An hour or so of reverie, quiet save the brush of the wind and watchful gaze of Elderbug. He didn’t do anything at all, which was interesting, because most bugs the Knight had met were always doing something, or quick to sleep if they weren’t. But he only stood there and watched them rest and slowly use the last of their collected soul to heal the aches in their legs and their back from the unfamiliar press of the old nail. Once that final trickle of energy was consumed they jolted to full awareness, startling Elderbug, and jumped off the bench without a glance behind.

They walked politely through town until they judged they were beyond its limits, hazy as those might be, and at the well they jumped down, following Elderbug’s indirect instruction. And so they were within the kingdom of Hallownest.

It was dark down there, and quiet was their first impression when they hit the ground, with only the distant whine of the wind above and the equally distant scrape of claws somewhere in the shadows, deep with just a handful of fading lumafly lamps to light the ways. The Knight felt the difference immediately. Their void, churning and tossing and so irritating while they were far from the kingdom, once they’d known the peace of the Someone’s call, settled some. They were closer, now. Much closer. 

If only they would call out _now_ , the Knight thought, glancing around. The path only went two ways, though, and if they had to look beneath every last stone of this kingdom they would find and meet and help their Someone, so to begin by going right wasn’t so hard a decision to make. 

But they could feel what Elderbug had meant by the maddening air. Ever so faintly, as they walked crumbling paths with worn stone and ringing with disrupted echoes, when they thought of something that stirred their hopes, their determination, their dreams and longing, something was there that stirred back. It incited the Knight’s emotions to grow and pulse, made their wishes into desperate yearning, began quietly to whisper that they could be one of many again.

So the Knight rebuffed it. It wasn’t hard to keep out, for they knew their own thoughts very well. More importantly, it was weak and faint and they were not one to give into anything at all, let alone something floating in the air relying on dreams. Their dreams, they knew, often took different shapes from bugs’. They weren’t one, not in part or in whole, though what that left they were unsure of.

Whatever it was, they were largely unaffected by the infection Elderbug had warned them of as a water beetle is largely unaffected by the water. They could drown in it, surely, but not without concerted effort on their part. And they were not in that particular habit. 

Apparently it was something dangerous though. The first creature they came across was small and unassuming and white and spiked, almost not worth the effort of killing, for it didn’t seem all that aggressive. But it did take them by surprise when it climbed over the end of a broken pathway while they scanned the road ahead and got them good when they stepped back and into it by accident, hearing it scuttle behind them when they’d moments before seen it crawl away in front of their eyes.

And, well, they were hungry. The little thing didn’t give too much soul, but it was something. Interestingly, when it burst with a swipe of their nail its insides were a bright, flaming orange that pulsed and congealed before them. When it died, that same stirring call to madness spiked. They paid attention curiously as it wavered and settled again while the creature’s viscera dimmed and faded. So it was a disease. A plague, taking root within the bodies of bugs. 

Little wonder none of the travelers ever went to see Elderbug again.

The Knight carried on and it didn’t take much longer to come across a temple, imposing and dark, and within it, a bug. They walked up to them and waited until the bug, apparently deep in thought, took notice.

The bug glanced down and must not have heard the Knight come in, because they twitched in surprise. To their credit they were quick to recover, and quicker to offer friendly greetings. “Hello there! How delightful to meet another traveler on these forgotten roads.” He smiled down at the Knight, and they could detect no falsehood.

How curious. Were all Hallownest bugs so kind? Surely not, or their Someone wouldn’t be in so much pain. The Knight had rarely been glad to meet another traveler before, and those others had certainly never been glad to meet them.

When they didn’t respond, however, the bug spoke again. “I'm Quirrel. I have something of an obsession with uncharted places.” He said and gestured at the temple. “This ancient kingdom holds many fascinating mysteries, and one of the most intriguing of them is standing right before us.” He continued, turning back to scrutinize it with curious, intelligent eyes.

The Knight was sure it did, and waited for him to explain. It only took a minute or so, when Quirrel realized they were still watching him. He smiled at them again, fortunately taking their stoicism for interest, and did so.

“A great stone egg, lying in the corpse of an ancient kingdom. You wouldn’t happen to know what for, would you?” He mused aloud, half to the Knight and half to himself and not particularly expectant. “How warm it feels, and how different the design is from the architectural themes surrounding it. Something lies within, but what?” 

He sounded like something of a researcher or a scholar to the Knight. Context, question, details, the old formula. But a traveler wouldn’t spare the time and concentration to follow through and discover the answer, and this bug was a seasoned traveler if ever they had seen one, so they let that thought fade.

An egg, though? The Knight was sure that was something of a stretch, though it _was_ fairly egg-shaped. They glanced over it dubiously. In their opinion, it looked more like a huge river stone, or maybe a paperweight. They’d never seen an egg to have such an intricately woven inside, either, but they _could_ feel the warmth it gave off, just a little above the temperature of the surrounding air. It even had a meticulously detailed fracture pattern of where, presumably, something massive had hatched from it, though within this hole now was a woven door embedded with three symbols. Masks? 

If one of them matched Quirrel’s, the Knight was too small to see it.

“I do so love a mystery. Hallownest is quite a promising place, presenting me with this right inside the gate. I wonder what other marvelous things lie below.” Quirrel said with only slightly self-conscious, breathless awe and a soft laugh.

Ah, here we were, the start of the rambling. The Knight was quietly amused that Quirrel followed the usual chain of events so neatly, and settled in to listen. He had a nice laugh, and a nicer voice. Perhaps he _should_ have been a scholar, and taught stories and grand tales to anyone lucky enough to listen.

“For so long I've felt drawn here. So many tales full of wonders and horrors. No longer could I resist. I just had to see it for myself. And what a time I chose to arrive! This dead world has sprung to life. The creatures are riled up and the earth rumbles. The air is thick.” Quirrel paused a moment, a shred of concern on his face, overshadowed by wonder. “I wonder what could have brought it all about?”

What the Knight wouldn’t give to know, for whatever the cause, among the riled creatures was the one they had come to find. 

Quirrel took notice of them again and now truly looked at them, scanning them up and down, but not in a judgmental way. They cocked their head at him, curious what he thought and willing to encourage him to share.

“That isn’t a terribly impressive nail, my friend. You may find yourself needing more than that to persist within this ruin.” Quirrel told them. Less flattering than they’d hoped for, but fair. The Knight drew their nail and glanced over it. The old thing was cracked and dull, that much was true. They’d hardly noticed when they’d picked the thing up. Everything of the wastes was cracked and dull. They glanced at Quirrel’s nail, significantly better cared for and significantly sharper.

“Though that's no problem! One only has to look around. Plenty have come before us and most have met their grisly end, many more equipped than you and I.” Quirrel said cheerfully. 

The Knight regarded him and their amusement grew, though he wouldn’t have known. They supposed Quirrel truly was a traveler, to have such an upbeat outlook on such an unfortunate reality. And evidently assumed the Knight wasn’t one, or hadn’t been at it long, to think they wouldn’t know the consequences of that unfortunate reality just the same.

“I'm sure they wouldn't mind were a fellow explorer to relieve them of their tools. It's a kindness, really. The dead shouldn't be burdened with such things.”

The Knight stood still and watched him. They did not consider the dead often enough to have formed an opinion of their weaponry habits, for their mind always seemed to skitter sideways away from the idea, and it wasn’t important enough to them to pursue it, but they did believe that the living were the ones who truly felt the weight of a weapon in their hands and on their mind. But if seeing the dead at peace gave Quirrel a measure of his own, then far be it from them to judge.

Quirrel laughed softly at their blank gaze and his eyes softened to something less impersonal, like he was seeing someone he liked. “You're a short one, but you've a strong look about you. I’m sure you’ll do just fine down here.” He assured them with an encouraging smile. 

The Knight liked Quirrel, so they nodded and didn’t notice that their void had been still as an underground lake since they had entered the temple.

They gazed up at the sealed entrance to the egg searchingly, as Quirrel did, and saw nothing more to glean. So, still hungry, they turned to go, thinking hopefully of another of the white, spined bugs with the infected insides. 

And of their search. It hadn’t been long, only a few days at most since the last call, so they knew their Someone wouldn’t be giving them any hints anytime soon. 

They only took a few steps before, behind them, so close that had there been nothing in the way they could have seen the blacks of their Someone’s eyes, the one who called them called out once again.

A yawning, jagged pit opened in the Knight’s chest and drove them to their knees, deeply betrayed heart-wrenching misery. It was like an unfettered wail, open-throated and begging. If before they had heard open calls, now their Someone had focused their plea directly into their skull, and the force of their strain was undiluted.

It was unbearable, growing in pulses and ever so slowly. It was like a second heart, bloated and pressing wetly, slickly against their own, hot as the sun and growing hotter. With every beat it inflamed their agony, used it as a medium and grew and grew. That hot, crushing, growing organ sickeningly trembled and grappled with them as they beat it back with claw and nail, pressed back against its force though it turned and curdled their very soul. Desperately they held it close, even as it invaded them mind and body. It was trying so hard to escape, and prevented from that it turned its creeping fury back into them and _burned_.

Unbearable. Necessary. For though the infectious heart was straining at their seams, though each pulse felt like it would be the last, like they’d finally burst and fall useless under its weight, the only thing they could not do was give in. 

And though in hearing their call the Knight wished desperately for them to let the pressure go, to release it somehow and stop the way they could _feel_ their carapace pull apart from the inside, soft segments bulging out and threatening for so long to rip apart, worn thin under the stress of so very long, the call was only one way, and the Someone, the Knight knew, could not ever conceive of it.

No, they could not be their own solution, but they knew the Knight was there and they _knew_ they had come to their call and they knew they were leaving and the betrayal hurt them so deeply that for a moment the thing pushing in their chest and glowing behind their eyes felt only right alongside it.

Their despairing scream subsided and the Knight found themself laid flat on the old stone, trembling like they’d never trembled (even back at the very beginning, when all they knew was fear, something they were distantly aware they knew now) and feeling, in the absence of that terrible searing heat, very cold and small. 

Absently, they heard Quirrel saying something, noted that he sounded concerned and close. 

So there they were, then. The Knight unsteadily pushed themself into a more upright position and pressed their claws deeply into the chitin of their chest, feeling their void writhe sick and disoriented. They focused on the little prickles and stayed very still, moment by moment regaining control and slowing the steady, uneven sway their equilibrium was undergoing, making the ground they could see fall this way and that.

It took longer than it ever had before, and when they found themself calm enough to look up Quirrel was sitting beside them with his hand on his nail and his eyes on the door.

He visibly perked when he saw them staring, expression open and concerned, and turned to face them with his whole attention.

“Are you alright?” He asked quietly, as though by speaking too loudly he might unhitch the world from whatever security they had recovered. “That was a nasty attack. Is there anything you need?”

For such a curious and morbid soul, Quirrel was remarkably thoughtful with his questions, the Knight thought. They felt their head might detach from their carapace if they moved any further, but they also felt they owed Quirrel, who had sat and protected them for however long it had been that they couldn’t sense or react to danger, something. They gave a very slow shake of their head.

Quirrel nodded and adjusted his grip on his nail, gazing distantly out the door of the temple. “I don’t know that it’s related, but something similar happened to me exploring the ruins of a kingdom not so far from this one. You see, I was traveling beneath a great sea, through a series of tunnels dug by an ancient people who I guessed must have not seen as you or I do, or perhaps had other means of producing light, because in all my travel there I hadn’t found a single lantern or lumafly. Now, I had been down there some time, but had somehow never crossed a line that I now suspect perfectly bisected the kingdom.” 

Quirrel stopped to laugh quietly, though the Knight felt that it was at events long past, before continuing. He spoke of a powerful, constant force he hadn’t noticed building ever so slowly until, when he crossed an invisible point, it was all at once completely reversed and took his ability to differentiate up and down with it, leading to him dropping his lumafly light to the ground, where the glass shattered and the little bug flew away. There in the dark, utterly disoriented and utterly alone, Quirrel had thought he might die. Seconds, then minutes passed and it was impossible to move without overwhelming vertigo, and without the light, the darkness was absolute. It would have been an unfortunate and boring death, to slowly succumb in a quiet cathedral echoing back only the scrape of his scrabbling claws on the floor, only held captive by the loss of his senses.

Quirrel paused for a second and the Knight realized they were utterly captivated focusing on the tale, and that the slow sickening churn of their void had calmed to an unhappy ripple.

Fortunately, Quirrel told them with a wry smile, the shift only took less than ten minutes to get used to and from then on he’d been completely fine. He’d even discovered with wonder that while he had been riding out the effects, domed white shells he had taken as simple ornamentation embedded in the ceiling had begun to glow ever so faintly. And, as he had climbed to his feet and craned his neck to see them better and, still off-balance, promptly crashed into a delicate piece of thin crystal embellishment attached to the walls, which shattered explosively on the fine stone floor, the shells above glowed brilliant white.

They were activated by sound. Quirrel had quickly found that, while he’d admit he couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket, the acoustics of every building and monument and tunnel were such that a voice raised in song kept the shells bright enough to see by. Quirrel marveled to think how bright the kingdom he’d taken to be eternally black and shadowed would have been, populated by a singing, talking people. 

Of course, he added with a chuckle, then when he’d been making his way back he’d tripped right over the line again and spent another ten minutes trying to keep his head from spinning off, but some lessons take a few repeats, wouldn’t you think?

To his credit it took the Knight to nearly the end of his story to realize his game, but Quirrel’s distraction had done its trick by then, and had calmed them down enough that they sat cross-legged and watched him intently while he reenacted his adventure with animated hands and a pleasant, equally animated voice.

When Quirrel was done they sat in silence for a few moments and reveled in the quiet companionship, heart light.

But as soon as they noticed they were happy, their void chilled with only a glance at the sealed door.

The Knight was on their feet with their nail drawn and drawn back to strike before Quirrel could make more than a startled noise. They lashed out at the door with all their might and their nail didn’t even make contact, just deflected away an inch from the woven rock to rebound off of the floor. They struck again and then again, each time the same, and then stopped and stared. 

No wonder their Someone hadn’t escaped in all the time they’d been trapped here. They were sealed in, and it was like the power was spun from steel. 

“My friend, what’s wrong? What are you doing?” Quirrel was asking, sounding more confused than alarmed, to his credit, but certainly alarmed as well. 

The Knight turned to look at him and jabbed an accusatory hand at the sealed door. Their Someone was only feet away, they who the Knight had crossed kingdoms and dusty lifeless wastes and treacherous ice-slick ridges and, it seemed, everything else this world could throw at them to find and to help. 

Their Someone was convinced they would leave them behind and it _tore_ at the Knight, the feeling so fresh and startling that it was worse in its novelty, but their way was blocked by a seal impenetrable. Bound to-

Oh! Bound to what? The Knight scrutinized the door very closely, laid a deliberate hand on the locking seal keeping them from it. It flared gently white, an ascetic absence of color more than a glow, and the three curious shapes embedded in the door lit with the same.

They burned the image of the three masks, for they appeared to be teardrop-shaped masks with hollow black eyes, into their mind.

“Do you think you know what’s inside the egg?” Quirrel asked, and they heard a carefully disguised hint of that love of the unknown in his voice.

They nodded stiffly. 

Quirrel seemed to realize the futility of questioning them further, because he only walked up next to them to lay a careful claw on the seal and shiver.

“It feels like this place shouldn’t be touched, though I doubt there’s anything you or I could do to disturb it. Are you certain you want to open it?” He asked quietly, looking down at them.

The Knight nodded before he was finished speaking and he sighed in response. 

“Well, some wary traveler’s bad impressions probably won’t keep you from discovering how. And if you know what’s inside and still want to open it, maybe I’m in the wrong after all. But,” Quirrel blinked away a distant expression and looked them up and down, more thoroughly than before, eyes narrowed with concern. 

“Think carefully about what you do. There is something frightening about this place, something that tugs at me and tells me to go and yet, warns me to face it.”

He set a gentle, light hand on the blunt tip of one of the Knight’s horns and gave it a pat. It shook them out of the painful tug-of-war they were experiencing, torn between staying here and never abandoning their charge and rushing out to find and destroy their bindings, and they looked up at Quirrel.

“You’re shaking, little one.” He said gently.

The Knight looked down at their hands and saw he was right. Their void was, again, jittery and unsettled.

“Rest somewhere safe before you try to unravel this mystery. If we ever meet on the road, know that you have a friendly face with me.” Quirrel turned and walked down the steps and out of the temple, and the Knight could only watch him go and despair that they could not express how grateful they were for such a complete stranger’s kindness.

When they got their Someone freed, they would need to introduce them.

The Knight turned back to the sealed door. With the strength of the seal untested, it dimmed back into the dusty grey of the woven stone, still and cold and quiet.

The moments dragged on as they watched the Black Egg, then minutes. The Knight felt the heavy weight of their task upon them like it was draped across their shoulders and laid their forehead against the white glow, trying to think loudly that they would not leave the being behind the door to this fate, that they would only be gone as long as they needed to, that they would be back, of course they would be back.

Of course they would.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this is the longest thing I've ever written by miles. It exists entirely because I felt real bad about killing Herrah, who doesn't even get to talk in it for ages. To sum it up I'd call it a much closer look at the canon story, assuming one only saw the canon story from a blurry speedrun vid, with plenty of unnecessary sidetrips and worldbuilding headcanon to fill in the gaps, and also a healthy dose of Oh No You Don't when someone's about to kick it. 
> 
> And it's ultimately focused on Ghost and their siblings, and on the importance of love and hope in hopeless situations and hippy-dippy things like that. Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy.


	2. Inhabitants of Hallownest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Knight makes several new friends, and chases a third.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Physical injury, easily fixed.

If the being within the egg heard them, they did not call out again, and the Knight suddenly found themself wishing that they wouldn’t. No matter how it would reassure the Knight, every call they released had borne more and more of that intensifying strain. They couldn’t help but think that their Someone cried out when the load became too much to bear.

They would take a thousand of their poor reactions to the call-up-close to see that the one they were so familiar with (but did not know) did not ever have to scream out again.

But between now and then would be, it seemed, a lot of searching. An entire kingdom, if they were especially unlucky, they mused with some impatience as they rounded the entrance of the temple and set off a different way than they’d come.

No matter, they thought as they leapt path to path, stone to weathered stone, they had nothing if not time. The thought wasn’t as reassuring as it usually was, remembering the slowly mounting agony, the brilliance and sweltering heat and pressure. Their void, beginning to shiver again, churned sickly.

They explored perhaps a little more hastily than usual, and took a few hits they shouldn’t’ve, but the maddened bugs here threw caution to the wind and so soul wasn’t hard to come by, and neither were quiet places to focus it. Abandoned kingdoms had their benefits. The Knight passed through what might have at one point been a more heavily used part of the crossroads, strung with platforms and lifts, and at the bottom of a tall chamber carved wide and high as though to hold much of something, strung with ancient infrastructure, they heard humming.

Intrigued, they followed the sound below and through a collapsed floor, tiles crumbling into the grey dry earth that characterized the surface too, landing just next to a bug scribbling busily at a sheet of paper.

The Knight noticed, ignoring the bug as they jolted at their sudden entrance, that this bug had perhaps been scribbling busily for quite some time, considering all of the scattered pages with detailed lines marked and marked out covering every surface. The Knight picked one up as the bug shook off their shock and went back to drawing as though they were never interrupted.

Maps. They were all various stages of maps, drawn to very vague detail. For all of the many branching paths the Knight had seen, there didn’t seem to be quite as many written down. Perhaps these were for somewhere specific, or maybe they were just unfinished.

They glanced over at the bug, the skilled cartographer they guessed, and back at the scrawled map they held. Well, it wasn’t the best work they’d ever seen, but it was certainly legible and had a good measure of scale. It was worth picking up a copy, however incomplete. They weren’t so bad a cartographer themself, but they were better at it when there was something to work off of. Kingdoms had a tendency to be sprawling, and they didn’t want to take too long if it could be avoided.

So they walked up next to the cartographer bug and offered them the page. It took them a moment to glance up from their work, and when they did, they startled themself again.

“Hmm? Ah, hello there.” He greeted hastily.

Not a particularly anxious bug, then, just a focused one.

“Come down to explore these beautiful old ruins? Don't mind me... I've a fondness for exploring myself. Getting lost and finding your way again is a pleasure like no other. We're exquisitely lucky, you and I...” He smiled fondly at his maps, mostly evident in the tilt of his head with his thick glasses and long proboscis. He took the page they offered and scowled at it, tossing it aside to flutter down back amidst the rest of what the Knight now thought were failed iterations.

“I'm a cartographer by trade, and I'm working on mapping this area right now. Would you like to buy a copy of my work so far?” He offered, holding up his current page for scrutiny.

They peered at it. This one did look rather nice, if simplistic. They had always preferred simpler maps like this. Less detail to get lost in, more space to doodle on. They nodded once.

He perked up. “Wonderful! This one’s not entirely complete yet, so it’ll be thirty geo.”

Geo? The currency of Hallownest, of course there would be one. How strange that the bugs of Hallownest would still use it.

The Knight cocked their head at the cartographer, who deflated. “You don't have enough geo? Ah, I understand. I'd give you the map as a gift, but I don't think my wife would be very happy if I did. ‘All our food is made of geo’, as they say.” He laughed, seemingly cheerful at just the mention of his partner.

That was reasonable, but didn’t answer their question. What was a geo? They stared at him and cocked their head the other way, hoping to convey that they were asking for an explanation.

The cartographer stared at them equally blankly, clearly not drawing the connection. They watched each other silently for a minute or more.

“Are you… Threatening me?” He asked, lilting his voice upwards as though he was pretty sure that wasn’t the case, but wanted to rule it out regardless.

The Knight slowly shook their head no.

“Oh, good.” He gave a relieved breath of a laugh. “Did you need something else?”

The Knight considered a moment, then nodded.

“Okay,” the cartographer said patiently, “What?”

The Knight watched him dolefully, wondering if they could finagle the answer out of Quirrel somehow, or Elderbug, instead.

“You don’t say much, hm?” The cartographer said aloud as though they couldn’t hear, either. “Ok, how about we try something else. I’ll guess what you want, and you tell me if I’m getting close. Does that work?” He offered.

The Knight nodded quickly.

“Alright. Is it map-related? I can’t quite imagine it wouldn’t be, considering we don’t know each other and all you know about me is what I’ve told you. Or, I presume that’s all you know. Do tell me if I’m making a fool of myself, assuming the worst.” The cartographer rambled.

The Knight nodded as soon as he was done. All he had to do was show them a piece of geo, and they could go. It occurred to them that if they did menace him with their nail, they could probably get their answer faster. They discarded the idea nearly as soon as they conceived of it; he’d done them no harm.

“Ah, we’re getting closer already. Is it related to where the maps lead? Because I’m afraid I’m not much of a guide, why, you might notice that my maps are only the particularly safe roads to take, and hardly any of the frightening ones. Though,” he was quick to add, “I always mark where I see different paths to take, so you’ll know they’re there in case you’re a more adventurous sort than I.”

The Knight shook their head calmly.

“Is it geo? Because I really must be firm about the price, I’d hate to disappoint my wife by just giving out the fruits of my trade again. Not too many travelers these days, after all.”

The Knight nodded fervently and pointed to themself.

The cartographer watched them in puzzlement for a moment, before making the connection. “Are you a traveler, then?”

The Knight nodded as quickly as they could, though they were getting dizzy.

“Do you…” The cartographer cast around for any thread connecting the two. “… Only have foreign currency? Because while I would love to see it, I’m afraid you’d have better luck with the relic seeker I’ve heard about, who resides in the City of Tears.”

The Knight shook their head carefully.

“Do you, possibly, not know what the currency here looks like?” The cartographer ventured gingerly.

The Knight shook their head no, then reconsidered and nodded with enthusiasm.

“Oh! Well, that’s a simple fix. Here, look, this is a one-geo piece.” The cartographer produced what appeared to be a shiny, ribbed stone from a bag slung over his shoulder. “They’re a type of fossil, I think, and they used to be found all over Hallownest. You’ll only find naturally occurring ones in rather secretive places now, though. Old kingdoms, and all. There’s also a five-geo piece, this one here,” he showed the Knight a shinier, larger version. “And a ten-geo piece that’s a bit bigger, but pretty similar, though I don’t have one of those with me.”

The Knight nodded once in thanks and took their leave before the cartographer could draw them back into conversation.

They’d seen geo scattered from the insides of the infected bugs, smeared with gore, or from the pockets of ancient, dead Hallownest residents. If only they’d thought to have picked them up, but they looked rather similar to the rest of the stones scattered across the crossroads, so the Knight hadn’t thought anything of them.

They wandered through the grey tunnels, keeping an absent eye open for any geo fallen from the bugs they encountered. As it would happen, thirty geo wasn’t difficult to get ahold of.

They wandered for a time, only a few hours, in the quiet of the cool stone. The excitement of somewhere new to explore, whatever the circumstances they found themself there under, was difficult to set aside. Hallownest was not an ugly or distasteful place, at least not at the Crossroads, but it was painfully obvious that it had seen better days. The floor, though uncertain and worn and covered in many places with remnants of the dead and the tentative, frail growth of what plant-life the bare rock could support, was level and deliberate in a way that precluded the notion that these tunnels were naturally formed.

Here and there were plain, yet carefully crafted, structures of stone and metal that had for the most part withstood the test of time. The Knight passed many iron signposts bearing white symbols they couldn’t wholly understand and didn’t try to, but it was easy to imagine a kingdom’s worth of inhabitants and travelers walking the smooth cobbled stone and taking their cues from the humble, longstanding white paint.

And just maybe, they thought as they cut down another hissing, rattling empty carapace with fierce orange eyes, they were dealing with a few of those unfortunate inhabitants now.

The plague had not been kind to Hallownest’s people. The crossroads were huge and sprawling in and of themselves, and they’d already found a stag station, manned by an aged, but kindly and dedicated stag beetle, and a hot spring or two, which they had particularly appreciated for that it seemed the water was imbued with soul. To think that they might be the first in years to see what had been daily, uneventful landmarks for someone ages past was stranger for that this was _their_ kingdom.

There were plenty of ancient kingdoms, and a handful of abandoned ones, but when they’d left this kingdom had been alive. Their memories, clearer now but so old they were paper-thin and full of inconsistencies, nonetheless told them of a frantic, if sparsely populated place. It had been loud, and frightened, and frightening. It had been hard to escape, though they also couldn’t remember how they’d gotten out.

The Knight stopped walking and looked around, lost in thought. Maybe they had even walked this exact path, only it had been unrecognizable and alive with bodies and sound. Voices where now there were none.

The Knight’s head snapped around as a high, wavering note pierced the silence, distant and faint. They drew their nail and followed it. It sounded like singing, but it had been a while since they’d heard that.

They turned a corner and then another, dropped down a crack in the floor, passed through a shattered doorway and went down and down again until an unfamiliar pink glow dimly illuminated a simple, but intact, doorway ahead.

Inside, the Knight found a mine. Deeper inside they could hear the clang of metal on crystal and, around and above that, a high voice warbling happily. They could scarcely contain their excitement. How wonderful, for someone here to have cause to sing. They followed the cart tracks and zeroed in on the sound, intensely curious.

It was a miner-bug, tap-tapping away at the rose crystal embedded in the stone. A wonder in itself that they didn’t have all the crystal they needed by now, the Knight thought, taking in the depths of the little mine. The walls and ceiling were studded with the stuff, creeping from the stone as though from a slow, angular drip. It did not seem to carve deeply into the tunnel wall here, just a shallow operation with a lift and rudimentary bracework.

Perhaps the volume of the crystal meant that was all that was necessary. That would explain the single, lone miner, their pick tinking against the crystal and by inches fracturing off a small growth from the mother cluster.

They hummed cheerily as they worked, not noticing the Knight’s quiet steps amid the steady noise of their work. The Knight watched them sing, marveling at the sound. It was high and lovely, and rough in a way that spoke not of great skill but of constant practice and, more importantly, of care. The world outside Hallownest was often noisy and bold, and sometimes rang and resounded with the beauty and music of dozens of kingdoms, but an earnest voice was something that always held them captive. Not cold or reserved or careful, but honest and open and unashamed.

They listened until the miner bug stopped to take a break, lowering their pick with a short, satisfied hum and breaking off their tune. They turned around and didn’t jump to see the Knight, though they could see the double-take they made.

They laughed shudderingly, but openly, and the Knight found that they liked the miner-bug. They sang another verse of their song, clearer and louder now as though pleased for the audience.

“Ohh, bury my mother, pale and slight! Bury my father with his eyes shut tight! Bury my sisters two by two, and then when you’re done, let’s bury me too!” She called out.

She laughed again, sweet and cheery, and the Knight found themself wishing they could laugh along.

“Do you know that one? It's one of my f-favourites! We can sing something else if you like, if you don’t know the words. You start singing and I'll join in. I bet you have a b-b-beautiful singing voice!” She told them, still laughing, a breathy sound of delight.

Oh, the Knight did not know what they had done to please her so much, but they bounced on their feet once and clapped to express their glee and their appreciation.

She giggled at their enthusiasm and waited patiently, but no singing was forthcoming. She waited a few moments more, then shrugged and hefted her pick to rest over her shoulder.

“It’s alright, sometimes I don’t know what to sing either. I’m lucky to have such a good favorite song!” She smiled at them and held out her free hand. “My name is Myla, and I’m a crystal m-miner, me and my whole family.” The Knight considered her hand and then shook it politely, noticeably warmer than their own.

Myla made a valiant effort to stifle her discomfited shiver and glanced around. “You wouldn’t happen to know where everyone else went, would you?” She asked lightly. “They were s-s-supposed to meet me down here to go back up to Dirtmouth, but it’s been an awfully long time.”

The Knight watched as she pondered a moment, and then shrugged off her worries. “Well, when they do find me, I’ll have all sorts of c-crystal to show for it. This is such a vocal vein. I can almost hear it singing back!”

The Knight listened closely as Myla glanced around again and leaned in close like she was about to share a very good secret. “You know, if you sing to the crystals, they like to sing back to you. You have to listen very close, because it’s only a whisper, but I know I’ll hear what they say to me soon.” She told them.

The Knight was very good at listening, they thought. They stepped closer to the crystal as Myla flourished her pick and went back to work, apparently finished with her break. She began to sing again and the Knight almost forgot they were supposed to be listening for the crystal, wrapped up in her high, throaty voice.

But they didn’t quite forget, and listened closely. They listened for some time as Myla sang and sang, and when they really concentrated they found that when Myla hit a particularly resonant note it reverberated back at them in a lovely way very different from open amphitheaters and temples and captivating in its own right, but the crystal didn’t sing back.

Which made sense enough, they supposed. Myla had been, judging by her ever-growing pile of crystal, at this for some time, and she hadn’t understood the singing yet. Perhaps it only took a dedicated and long-tuned ear. Something the Knight didn’t have the time to develop, they realized unhappily.

They waited for Myla’s singing to end and made to go, but stopped before they’d taken more than a few steps and walked back to tap lightly at her back. Myla, in the middle of a deep breath before launching into her next song, peered over her shoulder at them for a moment without interrupting her work.

“Y-yes? Oh, are you leaving?” She asked.

The Knight nodded.

“Good luck, then! Think about all your favorite songs and tell me one you really l-like, when you see me again.” She instructed. “You seem like you’ve heard an awful lot, and there’s n-n-nothing better than a new favorite song.”

The Knight nodded solemnly and decided not to do that, though not without regret. Maybe they would have the chance to stop back in with her, when all was said and done.

As they were leaving, they realized suddenly that they could not actually remember what their favorite song was. They stopped at the mouth of the mine and searched their memory, but though they could remember the shape and the feel of the many, many songs they had heard, music that had impacted them deeply at the time, they couldn’t recall a single string of notes.

The loss hit them like a physical blow.

So this was the influence of Hallownest, then? This was what they were giving up to come back, the final cost of passing the great, sealed gate?

The Knight drew their nail and strode away from the mine and the voice inside. If they were losing their memory of the places outside, they thought grimly, they would be at a severe disadvantage very quickly.

But was it the whole of their memory? They still knew each kingdom and every place they had ever explored, as well as natural memory could hold, and they still _knew_ they had heard all of those kingdom’s melodies. It was as though they were still there, just out of reach, fogged over. Perhaps it just took time.

Hallownest was a haunted kingdom, the Knight thought, and the rest of the world had no place here.

They made their way quickly through the Crossroads after that. It was laid out in a fairly uniform pattern with layers of tunnels and sharp turns that were, with some notable exceptions, easy to navigate, and once they’d reconvened with the cartographer (who belatedly introduced himself as Cornifer) and bought a proper map, it was even easier to keep track of where they were.

It took several days past that, but after a thorough search of the place turned up nothing more interesting than a few more one-sided conversations with Quirrel, a quick trip to the surface to meet Cornifer’s wife and buy some basic mapmaking ink and paper and some shiny little pins, and the discovery that the little green grubs they had found stowed curiously in round glass jars had a nest and a father very well-supplied with geo, the Knight chose a direction and started walking again.

The way they chose was quickly overcome with greenery, and guarded by more than one fierce, maddened bug. As they wandered watchfully down the path it pleased them to note the differences between the flourishing plant-life here and that of the last land they’d explored before the Someone’s call had drawn them back. Though the appreciation for the memory only lasted as long as it took for them to nearly walk face-first into their first giant plant-trap, snapping shut just a hand’s breadth from their mask.

Aside from the ferocious plants, it was verdant and choked and there was poison on the wind. As though in response to the unlikely harshness of their environment, the infected bugs here were just as dangerous as the corroding acid pooling below the lush islands of vegetation. No match for the Knight, but there had already been a few close calls with the littler flying insects, vicious and fast and entirely at home amongst the dizzying fumes and dense growth.

They took the time to struggle through reading a particularly ornate signpost directing them deeper into the overgrown place and away from the Crossroads, and with some difficulty, for the symbols making up the word were tied around each other like the vines twisting about the post, decided it probably read ‘Greenpath,’ which the Knight then decided was probably also the name of the district.

Only a few hours into Greenpath, and already covered with burrs and nicks from the unruly flora, the Knight found something interesting.

A flash of a red cloak and a white face that split into two symmetrically pointed horns, and they knew there was someone else traveling these lands. They had carried the glint of a thin, precise weapon, and moved with the surety of one who knew precisely how to use it.

And they had felt familiar, somehow, and by now the Knight had seen enough of nothing much to chase any hint of familiarity.

Not that this familiar traveler seemed to want anything to do with them, to their annoyance. The Knight chased them through what seemed to be miles and miles of thick, scratching plants that hid anything from purring bugs coated in the greenery, seemingly harmless but bearing orange eyes nonetheless, to mindless defenders long-dead but still tall and strong, their burning eyes belying practiced and ruthless sweeps of their nails.

And then they lost the traveler entirely.

They’d also lost track of the paths they’d taken, for all that there was more life here, that same life worked to obscure anything resembling a landmark. Irritated, they scrubbed at their eyes, burning from whatever the acid ponds were emitting in thick, stinging clouds, and peered around. Where before the vegetation had seemed thick, now it was all but choking to the Knight. The air was close and humid and though they always ran cold, the moisture was starting to condense on them and make their cloak uncomfortable and heavy, not really dry but not wet enough to drip.

Every path, twisting and thorn-coated and each exactly as green and difficult to wade through as the next, looked the same.

And through it all, they weren’t as good a cartographer as they thought they’d been.

They heard the furious buzzing of wings behind them, getting louder. The Knight brushed aside a whip-thin branch bristling with sharp-edged leaves, looking over their shoulder for the source and drawing their nail preemptively, and tripped over a root climbing across the path that, though they hadn’t looked down to see it, abruptly ended.

For a heart-stopping moment they were in uncontrolled freefall before they smacked against a wall webbed with vines as thick around as their arm. They scrabbled blindly for a hold with their free hand, digging their claws into the stems, but they split wetly under the force and the Knight was falling again.

They used the momentary leverage to twist midair and get their feet under them, and landed heavily in a bush taller than themself, though thankfully without thorns.

As it were, its branches were hard and unforgiving beneath the soft foliage, and they hadn’t landed correctly for the uneven ground. The Knight laid where they’d fallen, silently fuming. How many lands they had traversed without a scratch, and here in Hallownest they couldn’t seem to keep their feet on the ground. How many forests had they plodded through, but this mess of overeager sprouts had them fumbling.

Distant buzzing spurred them to try to wriggle out of the mess of broken branches and crushed greenery to get back on their feet. As they did, they found that under the stifling discomfort and their slowly building ire they were leaking void from a nasty crack in the chitin of their leg.

They focused, with difficulty, enough to direct soul to heal it and found, too, that they had no more once it was healed enough to close over.

They put their sword at their back and kept walking.

Quickly the path became claustrophobic and dark, thick strands of hanging vines obscuring their vision. The background hum of life among the leaves faded slowly as they walked, and they noticed the air was clearer. Soon there was only the rustle of the breeze in the grasses and the Knight’s own footsteps, crunching through the determinedly leafy floor.

It was odd, how green the world was here. The Knight was surprised by how little they liked it, when with most green places they were glad for the liveliness and the indication that all was well enough that survival, even if not by bugs, was attainable and beautiful in its vivacity. They liked the serenity, and the absence of suffering, and they very much liked the quiet. And plants made flowers. The Knight liked flowers.

But though there were certainly enough infected bugs amidst the greenery here, it also felt empty in a way. For all the bustle and hiss of acid and brush of leaves, it felt like the plant-life was too abundant somehow. Even in the most tightly-packed land apart from Hallownest, there had been space to breathe. The plants of Greenpath fed on something, dripped or bled into the soil they sprang from, and the Knight wasn’t sure they wanted to know what.

Just to their left, the Knight nearly walked into what might have been a massive fang, jutting weathered and yellow from the bed of obscuring plant-life. They glanced over it and kept walking.

Another appeared, then another, and the Knight found the narrow tunnel opened up into a wide, uneven cavern, blanketed in a flowering carpet of foliage. It was dim here, with only thin shafts of light from above illuminating the floor, though this didn’t seem to affect the even, impenetrable plant-cover. The Knight took a hesitant step inside, noting that even the breeze didn’t reach into this place. The silence was deafening after so long in the chaos of chasing the traveler.

And then something deep in the gloom and unseen among the hills of greenery gave a great thundering roar, grating and echoing in the open cavern, the likes of which the Knight most often heard immediately before a furious battle. They drew their nail and watched as a small hill shifted its bulk, hidden fangs spreading to reveal a shadowed, dark face with rows of narrowed and gleaming eyes. The Knight stood their ground.

They regarded the eyes and felt themself being regarded back.

There was a slow, rumbling laugh.

“Tiny squib... You approach fearless. Are you a hunter, like me?” The being asked them.

The Knight did not reply.

The creature watched them closely and they held still and ready. It made a deep noise they took to be approving as the moments ticked past, narrowing its eyes.

“Yes… You have faced fiercer prey than I, haven’t you? I can see it clearly. Good hunting, little squib. You do Hallownest an honor to stalk within its borders.” It told them and sat still, narrow-eyed and watchful.

The Knight waited for a beat, and then another. The creature didn’t attack, and it didn’t say anything more. The silence stretched on.

“Do you mean to run me from my den?” The creature asked.

The Knight pondered a moment, but shook their head no and lowered their nail. Ingrained experience and instinct alike told them that this being was too watchful to be easy to take down, and too carefully calm about the way it tapped its long, sharp claws as it watched them deliberate to be a victim of Hallownest’s plague.

Though they would have relished a good fight, it wouldn’t serve any purpose, and they weren’t entirely sure they would come out as whole as the Hunter seemed to expect they might.

The Knight stood straight and put away their nail, eyeing the placid hunter a moment more before bowing cautiously and turning away. When there was no rustle of quick claws through brush, they left the way they’d come. How strange and varied the people of Hallownest were.

The Knight kept up their guard until they were at the very mouth of the den and staring down the big bush they’d more-or-less crushed. It was being slowly picked at by a pair of the sharp sort of flying insect, and the Knight remembered that they were hungry.

Their nail made quick work of the creatures, which while too small to be a proper meal, took away the worst of the slow fading their void lapsed into without enough soul. From there they traveled on through the covered paths, keeping their nail at hand.

It was over a day more of crashing through the undergrowth before they rediscovered the red-cloaked traveler. They were perched high above the ground on a mossy stone monument of some sort, decorated with slowly arching swirls etched into the ancient stone and marred by a deep crack that looked more to do with age than intent.

They were tying a thread of silk to the end of a needle as long as they were tall, but when the Knight took a step towards them they glanced up and narrowed their dark eyes, stark against their pale mask. The Knight took another step and the traveler yanked at the knot, tested its strength with practiced hands and without shifting their gaze, and jumped off of the monument and away. A moment later the Knight saw the bright flash of their needle, and then their red cloak before they were gone again.

The Knight watched them go, then put away their nail and gave chase.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two up in a day! Mostly because I'm figuring out how chapters work.


	3. Warm Food and Chilly Greetings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Knight meets one more person. But then, does it count if they've seen her before?
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Greenpath Vessel, contemplated, still dead. Hornet, intimidating.

They’d gotten somewhat better at running through the thick brambles and down narrow paths, leaping over the deep vats of acid without getting their foot caught in a snarl of branches (and what a learning experience that had been, their cloak was still singed at the bottom), determining which places on the ground and above it could be trusted with their weight as they bounded from damp stone to stone and vaulted over patches of thorns as long as their nail.

Still it was a tense and concerted effort to keep the red traveler in sight, and they thought perhaps they’d only gotten away with it sometimes because the traveler, too, slipped up on occasion. It must be difficult, they thought, to reliably throw their needle where it was sure to find purchase in the stone weakened by roots and time.

At last, probably an hour or two into the chase past when any reasonable bug would have given up and about the same amount of time past when the Knight had committed absolutely to meeting the curiously familiar traveler, even if they had to chase them all day, they saw a glimpse of red flit into a high path tucked into the wall ahead.

The Knight scaled it without slowing down, jumping between leftover vestiges of a shattered pathway so overgrown as to look like jutting masses of foliage more than viable clawholds, and found the path narrow and dark, with dense grasses growing in loose clumps from the floor and long hanging vines from the ceiling. It reminded them of the hunter’s den, so to be safe they drew their nail before following the traveler through.

This path was a short one and ended abruptly at a drop-off that tumbled into something of a clearing, or the closest thing to one the Knight had seen so far. Ringing the open space were more of the stone monoliths, though their shape varied. Some were squat and egg-like, where others towered so tall that they cast thin shadows over the mounds of green growth at their bases and then over the clearing, too.

It was a beautiful sight, the Knight thought, with the light dappling the overgrown stone and undergrowth that stretched far past the clearing into a vast, lush cavern mottled with ancient carvings. In the distance, they thought they could hear a waterfall.

When they turned to look back to the clearing they saw the traveler waiting there, their brilliant red cloak (though now that they had a good look, it seemed more like a shawl) shifting in the slow breeze, squinting irately up at them but otherwise still, waiting.

And next to the traveler, the Knight saw a Vessel. They had a nail through their chest.

The white of their cracked mask seemed to shift their world sideways, drew the ground from beneath their feet, because it felt incredibly disconcerting that there was only one. They were certainly dead with a fracture like that through their mask, lying so still and impaled on their own weapon. The Knight realized with discomfort that it would have been more shocking had the Vessel been alive, and not because of its mortal wounds.

How wrenching, that when they thought of their siblings, and of course they had siblings, they could only remember death.

They jumped down into the clearing and made to walk to the traveler.

“Come no closer, ghost.” She said evenly.

The Knight paused in their tracks, more curious than anything else, and waited for her to tell them why she’d stopped. She didn’t seem out of breath or tired, at least not tired enough to show it in her stance. They noticed that she held herself like a warrior, and yet with a strange grace. Now that they could see her face, an unmarred, healthy white and brilliant in the soft light, the Knight knew they had made the right decision to follow her. They remembered this bug, though from where, they couldn’t say. Her name was-

“I've seen you, creeping through the undergrowth, stalking me.” She told them, and though she tried admirably to hide it they picked up on her biting irritation.

Well, if she hadn’t wanted them to follow, she should have stopped, the Knight thought, not without amusement. To her they replied by tilting their head just a little, and just enough to see the annoyance shine clear on her face for a delightful moment before she schooled her expression.

She drew her needle and pointed it at them and they saw the annoyance fade into grim intent. The Knight sobered with her and drew their own nail.

“I know what you are. I know what you’d try to do.” She told them evenly. “I can’t allow it.” She said with something like regret.

A chill washed over the Knight and they glanced at their fallen sibling. They were resting on the ground against a great carved stone as though time had stopped around them since their demise. Or as though they had only just met it, and even in such a lively and inhabited place as this there had been no opportunity to disrupt the little corpse.

Had the Knight been just minutes or hours too slow?

They looked back at the traveler in red just in time to jump away from her needle as she launched it at them. Hornet, they recalled blankly. Her name was Hornet.

Maybe they were misreading the situation, they thought as they ducked around her attacks, lethal and forceful, and responded with their own, banked and intended to disable rather than kill. They hoped they had been, though the likelihood faded in their mind with every whistling-fast throw of her needle they only just escaped.

She had been tired after all, the Knight discovered as the fight wore on, and she hadn’t expected them to fight back. It made them feel heavy and conflicted, watching as she began to shoot them astounded glances between fierce battle-cries, and then as she took more hits and began to bleed and the Knight noticed that her blood was blue, like many bugs, and nothing like the insubstantial gaseous void they bled. And then when she stumbled and it was only their quick deflection of their own attack that kept her from losing an arm.

They stopped and stood still and undaunted, their nail gently dripping her blood, while she panted and clutched at her shoulder where their nail had bit the deepest. Or so they assumed based on how she angled her shoulders beneath the fabric of her red shawl, quickly soaking through and turning a muddy brown.

She held their gaze as they watched her silently. Hornet swallowed, tried to slow her breathing, glared fiercely at them as they stood unmoving. The Knight hoped she wouldn’t try to fight them any further.

A thought occurred to them, and they held out a hand to motion her to stay still a moment. She regarded it with suspicion.

“What?” She asked them, calm as you please.

The Knight repeated the gesture and plunged a hand into their torso, the void parting obligingly. They liked to bring this trick out to intimidate when they thought a little healthy respect for the inexplicable would be warranted, and they hoped Hornet wouldn’t be too off-put.

They hunted around for a moment before they found what they were searching for and pulled out a fistful of crumpled paper, which they tossed to the ground.

“I didn’t know you could do that.” Hornet observed.

The Knight shrugged and reached back in for their mapmaking supplies, gone mostly unused since they’d left the Crossroads, pulling out a nearly full stoppered jar of ink and an already slightly tattered pen. They splayed their finds out on the ground, dipped the pen in the ink, and began to draw.

Hornet was apparently intrigued enough to not immediately leave to lick her wounds, but not quite enough to pay them any heed while she went through the process of wrapping her shoulder in silk. She pointedly did not watch them as they put the finishing touches on their representation of the Black Egg Temple’s sealed door.

She was tightening the last carefully crafted knot when the Knight offered the page.

Hornet scowled at them. “When we meet again, I will not go easy on you.”

They didn’t doubt it. Though her attacks had been aimed as killing blows, every last one, she had been slow. Intentionally slow, they now thought, remembering the speed and skill with which she had darted through the overgrown halls and caverns. The Knight wondered if she had been so slow when she had killed-

They shook their head and focused resolutely on Hornet’s face. Though they weren’t certain exactly what she thought they’d be doing that was so important it required her to test their ability in combat, they didn’t think she would be particularly willing to tell them.

She had taken that as a ‘no’ and looked like she might just respond with her needle, so they nodded seriously to tell her that they did believe her and waved the page enticingly.

Hornet narrowed her eyes in irritation and leaned back so it wouldn’t be quite in her face, and then narrowed them further thoughtfully.

“You’re not an unskilled artist,” She said, and sounded entirely too surprised. “Am I mistaken to think that this is supposed to be the sealed door of the Black Egg?”

The Knight nodded, elated with their luck. Of course she would know, if they could remember her then Hornet must be at least as old as they, and she had spent all that time in Hallownest as far as they knew. They pointed at the mask-marks, that had glowed brightly when the seal was disturbed.

Hornet fell quiet, looking at the page.

“You don’t know?” She asked quietly.

The Knight shook their head, then tilted it questioningly.

She looked them square in the face, ignoring the paper. If the Knight had been any part regular bug, they would have shifted in discomfort at the intensity of her gaze. It seemed to them like she was searching them for something.

After a tense beat, Hornet seemed to come to a decision. “You’re strong. Had you the will, you could accomplish much, little ghost. But I ask you this; would you be able to withstand the consequences?” She pressed. “The seals were placed for a reason. Hallownest is a crypt, but I will not see it a wasteland.”

Hornet’s eyes were hard and the Knight found themself resisting the urge to reach for their nail, though Hornet was exhausted and wounded and her needle was still. They realized that she would give her life for her kingdom, no matter that it was all but killed already.

What they didn’t understand was how they threatened it.

Except – oh. Oh, no. Except they did know. Their Someone was within the sealed temple, and their Someone held within them something blinding and furious. Something that crept bright behind their eyes, burned and corrupted. Terrible and powerful and _contained_.

The Knight didn’t understand how that could be, how one so dear to them could possibly have deserved that fate, and they didn’t know what undoing it would cause. But they squared that despairing thought away and reminded themself why they were here.

The Knight had come back to Hallownest for a reason, and they, too, would give their life to see it through.

They pointed grimly at the seal.

Hornet regarded them with something akin to approval. “Determined. Meet me in the City of Tears, and if you still would pursue the truth, I will tell you.”

The Knight didn’t move, frustrated beyond their ability to express. How ridiculously esoteric, couldn’t she just tell them _now_?

“Don’t give me that look, there is something there that you need to see.” Hornet scolded them. “I will be there soon. There is an adjoining tower leading to it from the Crossroads. Do not leave me waiting, and for Wyrm’s sake don’t _die_.” She added.

Puzzled that she could tell they were exasperated with her, the Knight nearly missed her take up her needle and, with an expert flick of her arm, throw it up into the canopy somewhere and leap after it.

And they were left alone with their dead sibling.

The Knight went and sat next to them. They wiped their nail clean on the leaves of a nearby bush and stowed it away, along with their mapmaking things and their drawing.

This was the second time someone had warned them about the sealed egg. Once they could shake off, but they trusted Hornet. The Knight glanced sideways at the Vessel lying empty and quiet next to them.

They trusted Hornet not to lie or stretch the truth, they amended. If they were to falter, they knew that she would end them before they could do anything that would imperil Hallownest. The thought was more comforting than they were entirely happy with.

Because the Knight didn’t care for Hallownest. What was one dying kingdom when hundreds more existed, thriving, in the vast world beyond? Further, Hallownest had had its chance and it had failed. It was a cruel place, a heavily rabid animal lashing out and closer to the grave than to life. Why give lives and souls to perpetuate it, when all there was to be perpetuated was an empty land and its burdensome past? Its history was sacrifice and pain and scraping an existence from the dust, where perhaps an existence shouldn’t have been found.

But, they considered, Hallownest had Someone. It had Quirrel and Hornet and Elderbug and Myla, who were tied to this place in a way even the Knight wasn’t. Perhaps it was foolish of them when they always seemed to outlive their friends, but the Knight had always been too loyal.

They crossed their legs and put their head in their hands and pretended that the dead thing next to them was only using its silence and distance to offer quiet solidarity.

There was a gust of wind that howled through the undergrowth and made them look up in time to see the dead Vessel slump to the side. They caught its weight and realized that its body was nearly gone, void dripping away into the air, and eased it down to the springy grass underfoot, patting its cracked mask once, delicately. This was a nice place to rest, the Knight thought.

They stood up and watched it for a moment more, and then left. If they were to find the City of Tears and learn whatever Hornet was willing to tell them, they would need to go. They needed to know what they were undertaking in as much detail as they could, they needed to know why the familiar soul in the Black Egg had been doomed to their fate, and most importantly, they needed to know how they could be freed. No matter the cost, they thought and felt cold recognition drip down their back.

The Knight needed their memories back.

As it turned out, Cornifer was exploring here, too. It had only taken them a day or so to wind their way back to a place they could faintly recognize, and the cartographer hadn’t been so far from there.

The Knight greeted him with a nod as he exclaimed in pleased surprise to see them there, and already had their geo out to pay him for whatever he had down for Greenpath when he began to chat companionably at them about the humidity and the complexity of the roads. That, at least, the Knight thought as they listened patiently, they could agree on.

It seemed like he’d been at his mapmaking for a while, because he seemed more than grateful for an opportunity to talk to a friendly soul. The Knight nodded along sparingly and listened while he related to them everything he’d experienced between now and their last meeting, and most of his thoughts between them, too.

“Oh, but I wish I could experience it all with Iselda. I miss her while I’m down here, but she’s not the exploring type.” He told them. “I couldn’t ask her to accompany me just because I get lonely.”

The Knight nodded sagely. Iselda had told them much the same in reverse, when they’d made the trip up to Dirtmouth last.

Cornifer talked a while longer, and the Knight listened, unduly happy to sit and listen to another chatter, until he seemed to realize it had been over an hour that he’d had them there.

“My apologies, I don’t mean to keep you! I was intending, now that I’ve charted most of Greenpath, to sit down and rest for a time. Would you like to stay and have a meal with me, as thanks for the company and your patronage?” He asked them entreatingly. “I’m afraid I don’t have much fresh, but dried food cooks up just as well, don’t you think?”

The Knight was taken aback. In all their experience traveling, they could not remember the last time someone had liked them well enough, or even not been too off-put by their otherness, to invite them to a meal. They nearly didn’t believe Cornifer hadn’t meant it as a joke, but as in everything the cartographer said and did, he was still watching them with quickly-waning honest expectation.

They realized they had been sitting motionless for too long and shook their head ‘no’ hastily. They almost regretted that they had no mouth to speak of, and no way to actually eat any food.

“Are you afraid you’d be imposing? Oh, nonsense, I’ve got plenty, and you still haven’t told me about any of _your_ travels!” Cornifer exclaimed.

At their blank stare, he continued, “Though I suppose you don’t have to _tell_ me, little quiet one. Would you be averse to drawing the highlights, if not writing them?”

With that he began to bustle around with building a fire and preparing a small stoneware pot decorated with a pattern of angular flowers over it once the flames grew high enough.

“Not a particular lot of potable water down in Greenpath, though surely all of these plants are getting it from somewhere,” Cornifer told them as he removed a mostly-empty waterskin from his pack along with a fistful of shriveled stuff that the Knight couldn’t identify, but looked sort of like the scant soft parts of a bug’s body once they’d been dead long enough.

He poured a practiced measure of water into the pot as the Knight watched, fascinated, then glanced up at them and poured in a little more. They wanted to tell him to save his supplies, but settled for making a game of sneaking as much geo as they could manage into his open pack while Cornifer’s back was turned.

While Cornifer added the dried food and stirred it into the water, he began to talk again.

“Here, there’s quite a lot of extra paper in my bag, and ink if you don’t have any, though I’d hope you would have visited my wife for supplies before now.” He laughed. “It does take some dedication to be ready for mapmaking!”

The Knight nodded and fished out their own instead to placate him. Cornifer started telling them a story about a very unfortunate encounter he’d had with a handful of creatures he called ”squits” that had taken solidly half of his rations, as the only way to keep them from biting off his head had been to toss them food until they couldn’t move.

“Which honestly wasn’t such a bad trade, considering I always keep twice as much as I need with me whenever I go exploring.” He chuckled. “Though I’m sure Iselda won’t be as pleased with my quick-thinking!”

The Knight froze where they’d been depositing another geo into Cornifer’s bag when he made as though to look away from the fire, but he only shook his head fondly and poked another branch into the flames.

They’d snuck in nearly enough to fill in all the little crevices around his supplies by the time the food was ready and Cornifer returned his attention to them.

“Can’t think of anything inspiring, or do you truly not want to share your experiences?” Cornifer asked them, noticing the pages spread before them were still empty. “It’s quite alright if you don’t. I’ve met many a recalcitrant traveler, and many more for whom their travels were simply too personal. Just say the word if I’m getting too open with my own!” He told them with a cheerful laugh and plucked a big shellwood spoon from his pack, fortunately from a front pocket and not the main bag, which had become liberally filled by the Knight’s geo.

Cornifer dragged a pair of weathered bowls carved of something’s shiny black shell out of another pocket and ladled half of the food into one, which he passed to the Knight.

They accepted it and held it in their lap while Cornifer poured the rest into his own bowl and sat back with a satisfied huff.

The Knight watched while he blew gently over the bowl, took a sip, and recoiled.

“Ah, careful there, friend, it’s a bit too warm.” He cautioned as though they’d been the one burned.

The Knight nodded and looked down at their own bowl, settled between their crossed legs. It was warm in their hands and on their thighs, comforting, even after Greenpath’s characteristic heat and humidity. They cradled it closer to better feel the warmth seeping into their carapace and relaxed minutely.

“Are you cold?” Cornifer sounded surprised, which the Knight thought was fair. “Ah, I’ve met some bugs that rather appreciated warmer temperatures. Even Greenpath would be a little chilly for a few of them.”

They shrugged, but didn’t loosen their hold on the bowl. Cornifer ate in silence, gazing out into the dim light outside. It was quiet for a while, peacefully so, and the Knight found themself quickly drifting into rest listening to the background buzz of Greenpath and reveling in the fading warmth of their food. They were startled to realize how tired they were, now that they had a chance to rest and someone watching out in their stead.

Cornifer, blessedly, didn’t break the silence or comment as the Knight relaxed into something like sleep. They heard him quietly set down his bowl and bank the fire as its light dimmed, and then sit for a while to presumedly keep watch. The Knight, though they couldn’t close their eyes, found comfort in the unchanging stillness of the cold bowl in their hands.

It was only when they heard Cornifer start to snore that they shook themself properly awake. The Knight looked up to see him sitting with his back to one of the overgrown pillars, still wearing his glasses. They stood up and set their untouched bowl next to him, careful not to make enough noise to wake him up.

Greenpath was quieter now, like its inhabitants had collectively decided these hours were for resting and peace. The Knight’s steps as they left seemed louder in the comparative stillness.

They found they nearly appreciated Greenpath like this, the only sounds the rush and hiss of distant acid and the calm, constant rustle of greenery, like the resettling of a thousand filamentous, restful wings. The Knight would appreciate it more when they left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly, posting is a little intimidating, particularly because I've been working on this one so long. Forgive me if anyone comments and I don't respond. I'm just nervous.
> 
> But yes, I decided for three chapters to start out. Good number and all. Also there's a lot to post still, and if I posted this many every week it would still take more than two months to get everything up. This is, however, the last that is edited as far as I want to edit. At some point one must accept that older writing just won't be exactly what one wants of it and move on, right? And Hornet's in this one. Also, Greenpath is bug Texas and no, you can't change my mind.


	4. Winding Roads Still Lead Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Knight finds Hallownest is bigger than anticipated, discovers the time-consuming costs of caring, and is a little younger than they took themself for.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Loneliness, another vague pass at the idea of self-harm that I only mention in case anyone wants me to. I get you. I've been there.

They backtracked to the stag station Cornifer had marked on the map, arriving just as Greenpath began to awaken again.

The Knight, thoroughly finished dealing with oppressive and pushy plants, rang the bell without hesitation and as soon as they were close enough to hit it with their nail, and in less than a minute the Stag galloped up to meet them. They greeted him with an unpracticed wave, and the Stag grunted in response, though not in an unfriendly way.

He cast an appraising black eye over the station. “My, this place is much changed since I last saw it. The greenery grows so wild, the station's like to be consumed.” He said.

The Knight felt that wasn’t an inaccurate guess, considering the wild growth they’d seen over what once might have been clear and uncrowded paths. They glanced over the list of stations, marked in faded white onto a crumbling, partially-obscured signpost curled around by delicate, twining vines, and noticed one that seemed hopeful. They pointed at it with their nail.

The Stag squinted at the writing.

“The City Storerooms, eh? Little traveler, it has been so long. I cannot say that I remember which paths lead to that station. Only the ringing of the bell from that place would remind me of the ways to run to it.” He grumbled regretfully. “My memory is distant and diminished, but I believe that station to be within the City of Tears.”

At the Knight’s encouraging nod, he continued. “Yes, we stags carried many goods to that great city, and many a traveler. A common trip it was, but one that I cannot now trace through my mind. I can only say with certainty that it is far from here, deep below the Crossroads and spanning the width of an immense cavern, one that any familiar with the stagways have wondered for the great expanse of, and complained of the journey one must take to avoid it.” The old stag told them.

The Knight looked down contemplatively. Yes, they could work with that. Down from the Crossroads, very similar to what Hornet had told them. They looked back over the station list and pointed to the Crossroads’ faint lettering.

“Ah, there I can manage! My eternal gratitude for your dedication to reopening the stations of my youth, little wanderer.” The stag replied.

The Knight bobbled their head happily, appreciative of the praise, and scrambled up into the old stag’s saddle. The seat must have been intended for personal travel more than transport of goods, with two rows of cushioned seats. The Knight sat down in the foremost one and ran their hand over the giving surface, a light brown and only just stained with age, marveling at the texture so unlike the more common benches. Comfortable transport, for all its merits, wasn’t something a surprising many kingdoms had.

The Stag lurched into movement as soon as they’d sat down. He was obviously taking pains to make the ride as smooth as it was quick, but distracted as they were the Knight was nearly thrown clear when he started to run. They sank their claws into the backrest to keep from toppling over the side, and once they regained their balance, they saw with dismay that they’d left little nicks in the soft covering.

The Knight glanced guiltily at the Stag, who expressed no supernatural ability to notice that his saddle was slightly more tattered, and sat with their hands hidden under their cloak.

Aside from the rocky start, the Knight found the stagways fascinating. It truly was no wonder that the Stag had forgotten the path that led to the City of Tears, they thought as the Stag chose unlit turn from path after unlit path, running at full-tilt without hesitation or consideration. He knew the way as surely as he was dedicated absolutely to his duty, but the Knight could see that it was more the result of running the paths over and over again an age past than any true memory of the identical dark, branching paths that would take them, as though by intent and surety alone, to the Crossroads.

And to the Crossroads they did go, though for all the Stag’s sureness, as though the correct path was laid out in lights before him, the trip had taken just long enough that in the dizzying, twisting tunnels the Knight had become certain for some breathless minutes that there was no way they would find their way free.

Maybe they should take a page out of Quirrel’s book and keep a light with them, they thought wryly as they pulled into the decrepit station and the Knight realized they had been clutching at the armrest, thankfully made of sturdier material than the seat.

They climbed down significantly slower than they’d climbed onto the Stag, which he remarked upon with an amused rumble.

“No need to be nervous, little wanderer. A stag can never truly forget the stagways, once they have learned them. It is only a matter of reconnecting the destination to the start.” He chuffed as the Knight shook the tension from their legs.

They half-heartedly glared at him over their shoulder, but relented to pad closer and give the Stag a grateful pat on his armored head, which he rumbled happily for and carefully nudged them nearly hard enough to make them stumble.

“May my legs falter beneath me and my eyes fail in the dark before I spurn any passenger of the stagways, but you are the most polite I have had the good fortune to carry. Travel with me again soon, little wanderer, and I hope that my knowledge of the roads of this kingdom will be more complete when we meet again.” The Stag told them fondly.

The Knight gave him another pat and vowed quietly to themself to find and show the old Stag the way to every station in Hallownest, if that was what the kindly beetle wanted. They looked him in the eye and hoped that he would understand, then turned and walked out of the station.

As it happened, they were only a short walk from Myla’s mine. They didn’t have any new songs for her, but it had been something like a week since they’d met her and they didn’t expect to be back in the Crossroads for some time. It would be nice to see that she was doing well.

They made the walk and the mine was just as brilliantly pink as they remembered it. The Knight wound their way through it with confidence, but stopped short when they noticed that, save the regular strikes of a pick against crystal, they couldn’t hear anything at all.

No, they thought as they began again to walk deeper into the mine, there was singing still, but it was quiet. Mumbled, confused.

They dropped down into the same shaft Myla had been mining when they’d last saw her and found her there still, as though she hadn’t left the spot since. The back wall was significantly closer, cluttered with harvested fragments of crystal mounted into tall, uneven piles. Myla was singing quietly, but now they couldn’t discern completed lyrics or even the tune, her voice gone rough and tired.

The Knight walked closer, kicking at a stray crystal on the ground to alert her to their presence. It clattered loudly, but Myla didn’t turn around.

The Knight’s void shifted uneasily. The plague-whispers were louder here, enough that they truly noticed them for the first time since they’d descended into Hallownest. Myla’s murmuring dropped off when the prodding infection in the air picked up and restarted when it died back, making a strange sort of call and response that the Knight did not like.

A dawning realization occurred to them; one they couldn’t believe they hadn’t considered before. What if these last few straggling bugs were susceptible to Hallownest’s resident plague? With few exceptions, they were new to the kingdom, all. Quirrel, Myla, Cornifer, they hadn’t been down here long.

The Knight drew their nail and crept around her until they could look into her face. Myla’s eyes, ever so dimly, glowed a dusty orange. As they watched, she finally took notice of them and smiled weakly.

“Hello again. Weren’t you just here?” She asked quietly.

The Knight shook their head slowly.

“Oh.” She fell silent, striking the crystal again and again. The Knight watched her, waiting.

“The others have been gone a very long time.” She mumbled finally. “What meaning in darkness, yet here I remain.” She chanted under her breath, not quite singing the words. “I’ll wait here forever, ‘til light blooms again.”

The Knight grabbed the pick on the next rebound and carefully disentangled her hands from it. Myla made a pained sound as they slipped it from her fingers and dropped it to the floor, and they couldn’t tell if it was a protest or because her hands hurt from clutching it so long. They held her hand, bracing it with their own, and looked into her face and waited.

“Wh-what’s wrong, friend? I haven’t been working so l-long, only…” Myla trailed off. She looked to the side and seemed to only now notice the piles and piles of harvested crystal.

“Oh.” She said, blinking.

As the Knight watched, the dim flickering orange faded back into the regular black of Myla’s eyes, the weakly reflected crystal-light the only color. They relaxed minutely and put their nail up.

She noticed that and tugged back her hand. “What were you d-doing?” She asked without heat, and the Knight could see honest confusion on her face, though thankfully not the dazed sort she’d had before.

They pulled out their map and pointed at the little arrow on the Crossroads indicating the well that ascended into Dirtmouth.

“Are you going up to town soon? I was thinking of g-going soon, too, but I’m waiting for my family.” She told them.

The Knight shook their head deliberately slow and pointed to her, and then back again at the map.

Myla fell quiet, considering. “There’s something that’s very angry here.” She told them quietly. “It wants me to be a-angry with it. I know that. I think it might be winning, too.”

She took a deep breath and tried for a brave smile. “Thank you so much for waking me up, but I can’t leave yet. You understand, right? Do you have a family?”

The Knight nodded slowly. They _did_ understand. Though they refused to torment their Someone by going to them before they could be freed, they wouldn’t leave them behind forever, not for anything. Not even if it meant their own death.

Myla grinned, and it was a painful thing. “Then you know I’ll keep waiting, right?”

They shook their head no. The Knight raised a hand and poked a claw into their own chest.

“Y-you’ll keep waiting?” Myla tried, face dropping into confusion.

The Knight thought a moment, then nodded and made a so-so motion with their hand.

“You’ll go… Looking?” She hazarded.

The Knight nodded. They weren’t in any danger from the plague, not like Myla. They remembered the uncanny recklessness and fury the bugs with bright, infected eyes threw themselves into combat with, and couldn’t reconcile it with Myla blinking shock, then wonder, then tears from her eyes.

They watched as she sniffled and grinned through her tears and scrubbed them from her suddenly exhausted eyes with both shaking hands.

“Thank you.” She said steadily, then sniffled again. “I don’t want to die, but they mean everything to me.”

Myla leant down to grab her pick and then stood straight, glancing down at the Knight’s map that they still held in their hand.

“I’m really looking forward to all the songs you’ll h-have to share when you find them.” She said with a wobbly smile. “I’ll see you in Dirtmouth?”

The Knight nodded.

They found a way into the geode-like depths of the mines, through a gate and up a creaking, dilapidated elevator that was much more run-down and much simpler than any other they’d come across in the parts of Hallownest that had once been more traversed. Myla had pointed them towards it as she was leaving.

“My f-family went up that way,” She’d said. “There used to be a way down from where I was mining, but we couldn’t find it, so they took the b-back way. I was supposed to find the other one, but I m-must have gotten d-distracted.” She stuttered the words thoughtfully, as though just recalling what she’d been meant to do, repeating them from memory.

The Knight nodded and stared at her until she got the message and grinned sheepishly, mandibles clicking, and set off in the general direction of the Dirtmouth well.

Then they’d taken the elevator and found themself somewhere so bright and lovely that it had taken them moments and minutes of staring and marveling to regain a hold of themself. The crystals in Myla’s little pocket of mine had been deep and resonant, but the world within the mine proper was a rosy, saturated pink. Crystals more than encrusted the walls and ceiling, they _were_ the vast, open cavern the Knight stood in, making up the arching, glittering ceiling above, huge and with edges as precise as if they’d been cut by a bug’s hand.

The Knight had been in the wasteland for so long they had nearly forgotten such brilliant color could exist, and they _had_ forgotten that it could be so encompassing.

They struck a cluster near them with a flick of their nail, and the universe sang. Countless majesties had they come across over the world, and they would never grow too tired to see one more.

The Knight suddenly wished Quirrel were there to see it with them. He would doubtless appreciate it too.

As it were, they could hear machinery from deeper inside, the great grinding clank and clatter of massive, constant movement and function. The Knight wondered how long had it been working as they passed from crystal-imbued room to room, over grating, ancient shellwood only saved from rot by the dryness of the air, past bracing poles roughly hewn and affixed to keep the ceiling firmly above their head, though it seemed the crystal had in the meantime grown into a sturdier support. With all the motion and movement, it seemed just as lively as Greenpath, and just as eerily abandoned.

They delighted in catching rides on the shifting conveyor belts that jumped and rumbled under them and leaping free just as they dumped their constant hails of crystal into somewhere they couldn’t see, for purposes they didn’t know.

It all had a sort of wonder about it, they thought, if one didn’t know the ‘wheres’ or ‘hows’. They supposed many things did.

But of course nothing could be purely fun, particularly not in Hallownest, for it seemed that the insects that had made the mostly abandoned mine their own had taken on some of its characteristics. Little flying gnats, not much smaller than the Knight, had their hind ends encrusted in pink, gleaming crystal. Something they didn’t seem very bothered by, but quite intent to bother the Knight with as they used the growths to flick fast-growing, though transient, shards at them.

The Knight stumbled and fell as a splinter’s expanding radius grew only just more than the distance they’d skirted to avoid it. They looked down, and saw that one foot was caught up in the creeping, blade-sharp mass. Their void clenched uncomfortably in their chest as the imagined feeling of being caught, grown over, awake and aware but immobile made them swing an uncoordinated blow at the glinting crystal holding them fast.

They didn’t quite hit the target dead-on, the angle a little awkward, but the entire thing shattered regardless, fragile as spun glass.

The Knight scrambled to their feet to find the fly hovering within reach, jumped before it could realize its prey wasn’t immobilized and backpedal, and cleaved it in half.

It fell with a heavy clunk-thud to the shellwood floor in two parts, seeping orange. They stared at it hotly.

Logically, they knew the crystal was as fragile and easy to shatter as sugar-glass, and even left alone it would eventually crumble. But the Knight couldn’t imagine a fate worse than imprisonment like that. It wasn’t an end they necessarily feared, but even the concept was deeply unsettling. The Knight was a creature of movement and freedom, and however beautiful the crystal, it wasn’t what they wanted to surround them for always.

How awful, the Knight thought and gave their nail a reproachful swing at the unresponsive corpse.

They walked a little faster after that, and were much quicker and more careful about the crystal-infested bugs, but soon the dangerous beauty of the place won them over again, helped along by the fact that the massive exactly-cut crystals growing deep along the walls never moved or grew as long as they watched.

No, the Knight wouldn’t let such a place be poisoned by unfounded disgust. Especially not when they could hit the little crystal bugs much harder than was warranted, and watch in satisfaction as they exploded with bursts of pulsing, congealed orange and fragmented crystal.

It wasn’t too much longer before they began to pick out the light, rhythmic tinking of a pick striking crystal. The Knight perked up when they heard it, ringing faintly from far off but still more than close enough to pinpoint. At this rate, they’d be back on the road to meet Hornet within the day.

The Knight listened carefully and picked their way through the mineshafts, some with vaulted ceilings decorated with massive, reaching crystalline structures, some so low they were only at most twice the Knight’s height, framed with shellwood. A few right and wrong turns later, the sound was loud enough that it might be echoing from any point ahead.

They turned a final corner, stepping into a room with a roughly hewn, but flat, stone floor and a ceiling as high and pink as any they’d seen, arching like the inside of a looming cathedral over them and run floor to ceiling with vertical conveyors.

And ahead, picking at a slowly diminishing cluster of crystal, was a bug that looked nearly exactly like Myla. Next to them was another, and riding the conveyor down was a third.

The Knight was pleased to see them, and relieved that their slowly growing suspicions hadn’t been realized, and a little irritated that they hadn’t seen fit to go back and check on Myla, so they hit the nearest crystal growth with the flat of their blade with a resounding clang.

The beetles snapped to notice them as one, every eye among them burning bright with infection. And then one blinked and the light faded.

“What a strange little thing,” They said muzzily. “Why, it looks almost like a grub. Such a dangerous place for a grub.”

The beetle next to the first cocked their head at the Knight, who watched them back tensely, and turned to glare at the one who’d spoken. “That’s not a grub, idiot, they’ve got a whole nail.” She scoffed as though speaking around a mouthful of fluff.

The third bug’s eyes dimmed to black as they seemed to roll them. “Lots of grubs get nails early.” He said. “It might not even be a grub. You were that size until your last molt.”

“No I wasn’t!” The second beetle shot back, the last orange gleam disappearing from her eyes.

“You were!” The first said as though uncovering the memory with dawning glee. “You absolutely were!”

“I was _not_!” She howled at them, brandishing her pick.

They didn’t seem intimidated, giggling and backing away as she took a, the Knight suddenly recognized, mock-threatening step towards them.

They watched the beetles, apparently siblings, squabble and laugh and the void yawned cold and sharp in their chest.

Would they be like that, they and their Someone within the Black Egg?

“So what brings you, little one? Lot of dangerous machines down here, lots of crystal hunters buzzing about.” The third beetle hefted his pick to rest on his shoulder and addressed the Knight.

They hadn’t thought this far ahead. The Knight thought a moment, then pointed at him and to the door.

“Oh, dear. Are you too young to talk? My youngest wouldn’t say a word until she was yea tall,” He gestured with a hand at about the height of the center of his carapace. “Though then she was always singing, a song for every moment!” He laughed hoarsely.

The Knight brightened and nodded firmly, gesturing to him to follow as clearly and obviously as they could.

“You want to show me something?” The beetle asked, already walking forward.

The Knight spared a moment to think how foolish that was, to trust an absolute stranger beckoning one through a hazardous land, but it served them this once. They nodded again and pointed back at the other two bugs, who had resolved their squabble into calling each other increasingly ridiculous names.

“Them too?” The beetle looked back over his shoulder, and then to the Knight with slightly narrowed eyes. “Why?”

They’d judged too soon, it seemed. The Knight thought for a moment, then turned away and reached inside themself for a page of paper and their pen. Recovering them and slapping the paper down on the ground, they motioned the beetle closer and, with difficulty, scratched out the closest approximation of Myla’s name they could spell.

It was an unholy mixture of maybe three dialects they’d learned partial symbol-systems for over the years, but as they hadn’t the foggiest idea how to mix the Hallownest system into new words and truthfully only a vague understanding of how to read it in the first place, they hoped it would be clear enough to understand, particularly with their unpracticed handwriting.

“Mee-lo?” The beetle sounded out, sounding entirely too critical for having gotten nearly the right idea from a slapdash affront to linguistics.

The Knight tapped the paper meditatively for a moment or two, then tried again with revisions.

“Mei-lah?” He pronounced, tapping his chin with a claw as the other two beetles wandered over to peer over his shoulders. “May-luh?”

“Myla?” The first beetle to shake off the infection tried. “Were you trying to write ‘Myla’?”

The Knight nodded twice, fervently, and wrapped up the paper and returned it to within themself, to the startled gasp of one and disgusted comment (“Gross,”) of another, and gestured impatiently for them to follow again.

“What’s wrong with Myla?” A beetle asked nervously. “We only just saw her… Dad, how long has it been?” They asked their father.

He shook his head as if trying to clear it and grumbled to himself. “Well, it’s been… It’s not been so long, only… We haven’t been up here long enough for her to have gotten into any real trouble.” He decided.

“Well, how long is that?” The first asked shortly, crossing her arms.

“Dad, I think we’ve been up here too long.” The second added. “I feel like I haven’t slept in weeks. Can we take a break anyway?”

“You’re such a wimp,” The first returned.

“ _You’re_ a wimp, I’m being serious! I don’t remember how long we’ve been up here. I don’t like it, I’m usually so good with shifts.” The second pressed.

“Quiet, we’ll let the grub take us to Myla and make sure she’s fine, and figure it out from there. It’s been a productive day.” Their father told them. “That is where you’re wanting us to follow you to, right?”

The Knight took some offense to being called a grub when they were entirely certain they were older than every bug present combined, but nodded anyway.

“Good. Grab your things.” He told the other two, who scrambled to obey. He turned back to the Knight. “Let’s go.”

The Knight nodded again and walked back the way they’d come, weaving their way back to the elevator Myla had shown them to. They were quick to kill the flying crystal-infected, crystal hunters they supposed, before they could threaten the unarmed bugs trailing them.

When they flicked their nail clean after the fourth or fifth crystal hunter, they caught the beetles staring at them warily out of the corner of their eye. The Knight flicked their nail a final time with a little more showmanship before replacing it on their back. Grub indeed.

They took the time to admire the grand crystals coming from the other direction again, though they still moved faster than the beetles, who had endured their unrelenting pace gamely but still lagged behind the Knight’s fast trot and graceful bounding. They could hear them mumbling to each other as they neared the exit.

“Slow down, traveler. Is she not in the mines?” The father asked them with some alarm.

The Knight shook their head and pointed upward with their nail, forging on.

The journey to the exit elevator was quicker than the journey from it, and soon they had all piled inside as it creaked and groaned its way down.

The silence was tense, but the Knight was very used to silence.

“…You’re good with your nail, aren’t you?” A beetle raised her voice, forcibly casual. Her sibling elbowed her and shot her a look.

The Knight looked up at her and nodded, reaching up to pat the grip of the nail sat securely on their back. They turned back to stare straight ahead, thinking the conversation finished.

“…Where’d you learn?” She prodded.

The Knight tilted their head to look at the ground thoughtfully. An interesting question. Here and there, mostly. Half by observing others, half through endless practice, and endless need for improvement. The wastes and beyond were dangerous places. They didn’t doubt that any properly trained knight would wince at every peculiarity born of witnessing and haphazardly combining the styles of a dozen kingdoms, but it worked well enough. They were still alive.

The Knight shrugged.

The beetle huffed in mild annoyance. Her father shot her a warning glance.

The elevator ride ended with an agonized metal shriek, and the Knight and Myla’s family stepped off. They pointed their nail in the general direction of Dirtmouth and began walking. Fortunately, in spite of their misgivings, the beetles followed.

The walk was more of a climb, and the Knight found themself waiting on the beetles more often than not. It was peaceful, the path largely clear of any infected, and those that the Knight did see were only little flies and crawling things. That was, it was peaceful until they realized they would pass the Black Egg Temple.

The Knight felt shame rise hot into their chest and burn behind their eyes. It had been how many days, and they hadn’t made the least progress towards the seals’ removal. They hoped that their Someone wasn’t paying attention, as they bowed their head and walked stiffly by the Egg’s dimly lit entrance.

The beetles noticed. Or, one did.

“Hey there, you alright little one?” The father asked them lowly, so as not to attract the attention of the other two, deep in a conversation that was half-argument.

The Knight nodded and for once appreciated that they couldn’t speak, because their throat was choked and any reassurance they might have felt they should give would have certainly not come out reassuring. The beetle walked alongside them, half-jogging to keep up, silently until the rope up into Dirtmouth came into view through the dust.

The Knight disregarded it, vaulting up the well. They glanced down it and saw the beetles at the bottom, deciding who would ascend first. The Knight turned away and glanced over the town.

It was just as quiet as the first time they’d seen it, still lifeless save Elderbug standing like a fixture near the bench and the newly lit glow from within Iselda’s shop. Elderbug saw them and waved. The Knight, half-startled, waved back jerkily.

The wind howled and rushed around them as they watched the beetles laboriously pull themselves up from the well, belatedly realizing that perhaps they should have helped as the last, one of the younger set, rolled themself over the edge and landed with a shout on the ground.

“Oh, I’m feeling my age now,” the father groused, the hand not gripping his pick massaging at a chink in his chitin.

“Dad?” Came a disbelieving voice from a doorframe the Knight had previously thought belonged to an empty house.

There was Myla. The Knight was more relieved than they thought they’d be to see that she’d made it up safely, and hadn’t been retaken by the infection between there and here. She looked better, like she’d gotten a few hours of sleep and a good meal, brighter and less exhausted and, now, very happy.

The Knight stepped back as she ran to barrel into her father, who protested only weakly and wrapped his arms around her in a tight, relieved hug.

“I’m so glad you’re back.” She sobbed, and the Knight, to their alarm, saw she had tears dripping down her face. “I’m so sorry I never came to look for you, I nearly,” She hiccoughed. “I nearly-“

“Myla, it’s alright,” Her sister hurried to reassure her. “It’s really alright, we’re fine. We’re just glad you’re fine! Why,” She paused. “Why did you think we were the ones in trouble?”

Myla drew back and gave her a look half pitying, half fearful. “I didn’t realize either at first, but it’s been a long time. Kind Elderbug told me that we left to find the mines two weeks ago.”

“I waited for you.” She said then in a very small voice.

Her father crushed her into another hug, rocking her as she dissolved into weak crying. “I waited the whole time. I was so angry and blurry and _lonely_. I forgot my favorite song.” Myla said, more ragged sobbing than words.

The Knight looked away and dug claws into the chitin of their chest under their cloak as Myla’s father hushed her softly and her siblings patted at her and quietly hovered, concerned but also clearly mulling over her words.

Loneliness flared sharply and the Knight felt stinging well at their eyes. They brushed a hand over one and saw it came away gleaming wetly black. Oh. They hadn’t thought they could still cry. Of course it would be now, at the singular moment in the last years and decades when they were in the company of so many other bugs. Even Iselda had come to investigate, leaning on the doorframe to her shop and clearly assessing if she should say anything.

The Knight turned and in a few decisive strides jumped back into the well. They hit the dusty stone and didn’t slow down, breaking into a run as they heard one of the beetles shout half-heartedly after them. It was alright. They had their own reunion to worry about, and the Knight’s job was done. They were safe, and the Knight could return to their own worries.

It’s alright, they told themself as they sprinted through the Crossroads as fast as they could, unable to hear the fast-paced tap of their feet on the stone past the pulse of void that felt too big and pressing for their body.

It’s alright. It reminded them, in the vaguest way, of the impression their Someone had forced on them of the terrible searing light within their chest.

The Knight found themself standing before the Temple of the Black Egg with its quietly suffering inhabitant, shaking, head spinning, void pressing and stifling and wanting to cry out, the image of Myla’s father pulling her into a tight hug burned into their mind, and the Knight wanted Someone to be _there_ already so badly it was all they could do not to step into the temple and wail pathetically, silently, at the ungiving sealed door.

They couldn’t make themself do it. The Knight didn’t know how much it would hurt the dear one in the Egg to sense them so close and then walk away again. Even here might be too close. They should leave. The guilt rose choking and heavy, suffocating in their throat and making them curl trembling claws against the chitin of their chest, aching to dig them in and claw out the feeling, to subdue it and pay its toll with spilt void.

They stood there frozen, hurting and for all their efforts incapable of pressing it back down. How could they, the ever-calm part of their mind told them, when it had been thrown in their face so casually, what they were missing? What they’d always needed, and never had?

But they were _hurting Someone_. They couldn’t stay.

The Knight staggered back as though the thought had struck them like a nail, and remembered so clearly the betrayal that had been impressed upon them when they’d left the Black Egg the first time. They couldn’t be here until they had a solution to offer.

It was something to focus on. They took another step back, yearning desperately to be soothed by hands not their own and for the comforting pressure of another, and infinitely more afraid of hurting their sealed loved one. The Knight scrubbed a hand over one of their eyes, smearing the dripping black over their face, and wrapped the other arm around themself bracingly.

They would go to the City of Tears, they told themself. They would meet Hornet, and she would tell them how to help. They would do whatever she told them would bring down the seals, and then their Someone would be freed, and they wouldn’t be alone and neither would the Knight, and they wouldn’t hurt so terribly anymore, because the Knight would help them with the expanding, pulsing, too-hot thing contained in their chest breaking them apart.

And it would all be alright.

It would be alright.

The Knight took shaky, unsteady steps away from the Dirtmouth well and from the Black Egg Temple and focused on the path ahead, mapping the uneven cobblestone and shaped rock and watching for those dangers that lay between them and their goal, and allowed their mind to run blank.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey y'all know all those infected miners up in crystal kingdom that look Exactly like Myla? Well, they get to hop on the fix-it train too. Myla deserves the world and I can and will give it to her.
> 
> Ghost is... Not quite at the comfort part of their hurt/comfort. But it's okay, they've been at this a while, they can handle it.
> 
> But yes I've given up all pretense of a "schedule." I used up all my patience writing the entire thing before starting to post it, out of fear that I'd spook myself and stop writing. So chapters go up when I have time to edit chapters.


	5. Stags' Wisdom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the Knight is much too tired for all this, but now they've made friends with a pair of watchful eyes or two.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : None, except maybe amateur architecture aficionado Knight, and brief wounds.

They moved slower than they had escorting the beetles up to Dirtmouth. It took the Knight an embarrassingly long time to regain enough presence of mind to recognize that the reason their feet dragged heavy, slow steps and their head felt weighted and uncoordinated was because they were exhausted.

They hadn’t taken a break since they’d shared a meal with Cornifer, but they were used to going far longer without rest.

But then, the Knight had rarely had intense bouts of emotion out in the wastes, always carefully busy and distracted with keeping themself alive. Traveling treacherous roads and places where there had never been a road to start with, forging paths and cutting down the fanged, territorial creatures that only varied in appearance. It wasn’t a life that lent itself to contemplating one’s loneliness, and there had been nothing like an example of the absence thereof.

And they’d always heard crying was tiring.

The Knight spent a full day searching the lower levels of the Crossroads for a connecting point with signs that looked promising. Who would have thought that such a once well-traveled waypoint could have fallen, crumbled and reforged with the tunnels of great burrowing creatures, into something so confusing?

But eventually they did find what they were looking for. At the intersection of a more maintained hall of carved stone and iron, the ceiling higher and carved into smooth, unbroken arches, they found an elevator. It was a large and artfully wrought affair, the thin strands of plain metal curved into designs and curled around motifs of the repeating symbol of Hallownest, the six-winged carapace.

The metalwork was simple yet fine, carefully symmetrical, a larger example of the work that made up many of the signposts the Knight had seen still intact. The piece before the elevator had a sign in white paint hung from it, but the symbols blurred when they tried to focus on them. They picked out the words ‘city’ and ‘capital’ and ‘stores’, so they decided they were in approximately the right place.

The dust at their feet was disturbed, as though someone had been by recently. The Knight didn’t spare the thought to wonder about it and stepped onto the elevator, which took their weight with hardly a creak. They shoved at the lever and it descended.

They noticed with curiosity that the air here was both very humid and cut through with a deep chill, two things that did not often run together without cause.

Past the lift’s chamber the halls were much more intact than those in the Crossroads, and draped with the tattered remnants of thick, faded red fabric. Lumafly lanterns hung from unbroken poles, and moisture dripped slowly from the ceiling, stories above their head. The stonework was unrelenting, every pillar and structure carved to fit the whole.

Much finer than the Crossroads, and for all its dark and damp seemed like it might have been only abandoned for weeks instead of years on years.

It was also veritably filled with both carved rounded crates they supposed once held supplies and goods, and with walking husks of bugs wandering aimlessly across the slick stone floors, their dead orange eyes pinpricks of color and light in the dim.

They weren’t a difficulty, but the Knight was glad for the boost their soul energy gave. They hadn’t realized they’d been hungry as well as tired, but it was one problem solved at least, they thought as they cut another ancient bug’s weathered head from its shoulders and stepped back from the spatter of pulsing, quickly fading orange.

They were in a storeroom by the looks of it, but a larger and more decorated storeroom they had never seen. If this was how the bugs of old Hallownest had decorated when they could have probably gotten away with a purely functional cavern, what was the city proper like?

The room was so big that, fighting husks of what might have been workers there at some point, it was nearly half an hour of winding around stacked cargo and jumping up and down from levels of storage before they noticed the symbol for a stag station on a nearby sign.

They perked up some, sheepishly realizing they’d been less than alert, and followed where it pointed, and then followed too the next sign they passed to a hall carved into the far wall of the storeroom as it indicated.

This stag station was similar to the last, but far more cluttered. The rounded containers stood from the metal bench to the back wall, filling the space with their disorganized placement. From the ceiling hung placards painted with scrawled white symbols less polished than those of established signs. Maybe, the Knight thought, they had once been records of the supplies coming in and going out by the stags, or perhaps coordination to help with the transfer process.

Across the room the bell stood silent and untouched, metal gleaming where it hung from its swirling metal post as though the ages had left no mark on it. The Knight stepped closer and struck it with their nail, and as anticipated, the Stag came galloping down from the black tunnels. The Knight wondered if he’d been waiting nearby, or if he was simply fast enough to run Crossroads to City in less than the time it had taken them to walk elevator to station.

“Ah, little wanderer! You have discovered another of the forgotten stations, one I admit I have been attempting to recall since last we met. And how changed the storerooms are. This place as I recall it was a frantic one, full of shouting and hurry and work for many a stag.” The Stag told them.

He shuffled on the stagway path and leaned up to rest his head on the stone at the Knight’s feet. They knelt and patted him lightly, to which the Stag grumbled in appreciation.

“Yes,” He said in his hoarse voice. “The great City of the kingdom eternal was one that required much support. Many resources, many runs. A work I was glad for when it ran constant, but one the elder stags of the time oft complained wore down their feet.”

He rumbled a laugh. “Maybe I would have been among their number, were I so old then as now.”

“I seem to recall not much was ever sent back out from this station though,” He trailed off as the Knight scratched at the fluff under his chin, tilting his head obligingly to the side.

Then he huffed a doleful laugh. “Perhaps I truly am aging, to appreciate a rest so after a single run. Or perhaps it’s only been such a long time.”

The Knight shrugged, nearly lulled into their own rest by the chance to sit down. Their head dipped once, then again as they fought to stay properly aware.

“Oh, little one. The wandering paths you follow are not so straightforward as the stags’.” The Stag mumbled, the vibration of his great voice soothing. “Sleep if you are tired. A stag cannot fight, but I will wait by your side and warn you of any danger. Sleep.”

The Knight shook their head hazily. Hornet was out there, waiting for them. They had to go now, to stand up and move forward. It had only been a day or two. Three?

The Stag rumbled like the churn of smooth stones in a stream, felt more than heard, and settled himself with a thump to the ground. “Rest.” He told them.

Perhaps only for a few minutes, the Knight conceded. Just to shake off the exhaustion clouding their eyes. They draped themself over the hard chitin of the stag’s proud head, leaning up against his arching horn half again as tall as them, and felt something ease in their chest.

The old Stag’s promise was more reassuring than the Knight knew how to deal with. How long had it been, if ever, since someone had promised to look out for them while they were vulnerable?

And what was more astonishing than that, even, was that the Knight believed him. They were typically good at telling if another was lying to them, yes, but even so they could hardly trust themself this time.

But their head was tilting itself down again, their vision going unclear, and the Knight decided that everything had to happen at least once, however unlikely, and tucked their legs comfortably up beneath their cloak. If he was lying, they’d find out sooner than later.

When they regained enough awareness to realize they’d lost it in the first place, the Stag was snoring gratingly. Still there, but, to their half-hearted irritation, not nearly awake enough to keep watch. At some point the Knight had shifted to lie on their belly, more or less flopped over the Stag’s head behind his horn, and now they were staring at the unchanging grit of the stone beneath them as they rose and fell with his breathing.

The Knight sleepily tried to push themself up, slipped, and instead fell and cracked their mask against the stone with a painfully loud noise.

The Stag snorted and raised his head, and the Knight briefly panicked as they felt themself lift and slide off of his smooth shell and tumble onto their back.

It was as good a wake-up call as any, they thought ruefully as they lay there and watched the Stag shake himself fully awake, blinking away sleep from his tired eyes.

“Mmh, little wanderer? Ah, a nice nap, was it?” The Stag backed away from the platform and looked up at them from below.

They stared at him and rolled over to stand up.

“You look improved.” The Stag told them as they stretched the tension from their body.

The Knight eyed him, still a little annoyed that he hadn’t been keeping an eye out and more uncomfortable for that they didn’t know how to thank him regardless, and waved goodbye.

The Stag laughed. “Not one to linger. You remind me of many stags I have met. Call for me again when you find another station to remind me of, or if you simply need swift passage. And, little wanderer?” He called after them as they nodded and turned to go.

They looked back.

“Take care. I am aware Hallownest has fallen far from its days of old. Rest when you are weary, and meet no danger you cannot face.” He told them.

The Knight nodded, and felt a bit guilty. They knew themself well enough to know they might not even realize they were tired until they were near complete fatigue.

But they would try. If they died down here because they lost their ability to focus at the wrong moment, if they failed to rescue their Someone because of their own failure to properly prepare, their Someone would be left alone to suffer until they were freed by some other being or they died.

The thought chilled them, not in small part because in all this time either no one else had succeeded, or no one else had even tried. No, the Knight would not fail.

They nodded again, more firmly, and took their leave.

Just a short walk from the stag station, the floor opened into an entrance to the rest of, from what Hornet had told them, they assumed to be a tower.

It was strung with lifts that the Knight was amused to see must have been strictly functional, out of everything else, it seemed, in Hallownest, for they were only flat sheets of scratched metal affixed to densely woven strings of wire, each as thick around as the Knight’s arm. Few of them had containers remaining balanced on them, and for fun the Knight tipped one of the remainders off the side and watched it topple to the floor far below. Yes, they thought watching it fall, waiting for it to hit the ground, Hallownest was a kingdom that grew down instead of up.

Their head snapped up as they heard a raspy battle cry, and saw another of the husks. This one, they saw, was different. It was armored beyond its carapace, and winged, and carried a longnail in its thin warped hands. The garbled noise that left its mouth sounded very near to words, but nothing the Knight could understand.

A sentry. A guard, perhaps.

The Knight drew their nail as another and then a third rose to join it, and they saw that there were even more scattered around the chamber. Why so many? Had the last days of Hallownest’s life required its stores to be guarded so thoroughly?

Perhaps, they thought as they fended off and cut down one sentry, then the next, their dry carapaces clattering empty to the platforms below once they’d spilled the formless orange muck they had been carting around, perhaps Hallownest hadn’t been as interminable as the Stag had thought.

The last hollowed sentry swooped in too low to properly dodge, and the Knight felt its blade run across their shoulder.

They took the opportunity to lash out and open its abdomen, watching as bright orange splattered down and dimmed and the corpse’s wings stilled, sending it crashing down.

The Knight sheathed their nail and pressed a hand to their wound, feeling the void drip cold down their arm and watching it dissipate into the air. The concentration of the battle over, it had only just begun to sting deeply when they focused and healed it with a measure of their stored soul.

How interesting, that the long-killed protectors of the city had retained a measure of their training, and nearly enough of their voices to speak.

They shrugged to themself and descended.

Below that level was another room containing storage, though significantly less, and they saw that, if possible, the architecture had become _more_ elaborate and fanciful. Though it had been abandoned for years past, the Knight felt a little out of place with their fractured old nail stained faintly orange and their tattered, ancient cloak, a thousand times mended.

They followed the curving halls richly swathed with rotting fabric and painted with soft-edged shadows by the lumaflies affixed above them, listening to the ceiling drip.

It was only when they came to the first grand window gazing out over the city that they discovered why the water was so constant, in such a well-constructed tower.

The Knight ran closer and pressed their mask to the glass, looking out at the spires and curving arches and walkways and storefronts of a _city_. Of course they’d been told it was one, but to see the evidence that there had been people here once, bugs who lived and built something magnificent to defy their dissolution into obscurity, was overwhelming. The Knight was glad, if for nothing else, that they’d come back to Hallownest to see this. The City of Tears unfolded on and on below, and all at once Hallownest felt alive. Hidden in the cloaking sheets of heavy rain there might have been any number of bugs, it seemed to the Knight, and more than that, there might have been anything at all. Wonders, mysteries, secrets.

The spiraling designs and flourishes of the floors above no longer seemed an amusing excess, but only necessary and complementary to such a vast and complete larger work. For the first time since their return to Hallownest, the Knight could truly imagine that it had once been inhabited by tens of thousands, if not more.

Though the rain blurred their view through the glass and fell in torrents over what must have been the whole city, the Knight could understand the scale of what they saw. The sprawling, carefully, painstakingly designed jewel of a kingdom, created for those who lived within. Old and long-forgotten, but still everlasting and beautiful.

“I was just as taken with the view when I first laid eyes on it, too. It’s really something, isn’t it?” Came a smiling, fond voice behind them.

The Knight had whipped around and drawn their nail before recognizing Quirrel, blinking good-naturedly at them and raising his hands to show they were empty.

“Sorry, sorry, I couldn’t bring myself to interrupt another wanderer seeing the city for the first time.” Quirrel said apologetically as they lowered their nail and gave him a sharp look before putting it away. They might have taken his head off if he’d been any closer. “It makes you understand why Hallownest was called the ‘kingdom eternal,’ doesn’t it?” He said wistfully.

He was sitting comfortably with his ankles crossed and one arm thrown over the back of a bench, watching the Knight with friendly amusement. Still thrown that they hadn’t noticed him coming in, the Knight nodded in agreement and sat beside him, and listened as he spoke again.

“You know, in spite of the incredible architecture of the city,” He mused and looked out the window, “I only find myself wondering where it is the rain comes from. Surely we’re too far below the ground for the natural rain to fall through. And so consistently that the city itself is named for it. The rain has been falling on these towers and streets for as long as it has been called the City of Tears, and I’ve yet to meet a bug who remembers it called anything else.”

He laughed softly at himself as the Knight watched him pull a face. “Though that isn’t saying terribly much, in this kingdom. Have you ever been anywhere so clearly lived in and loved so well, and so abandoned?” Quirrel asked.

The Knight thought for a moment, and shook their head. They had been in many an abandoned kingdom, but always there had been someone, usually many someones, taking up residence in the ashes, building anew. Hallownest had only what was left of its oldest and most resilient inhabitants, and a scarce few unfortunate wanderers, and the infected and the dead.

They looked closely at Quirrel, but he was only watching the rain, relaxed and content in their presence. Not angry or confused, and not infected. That was good. The Knight desperately didn’t want to hurt Quirrel.

“Maybe it’s a massive underground water system, dripping endlessly through cracks above. I’d like to see it.” Quirrel hummed pensively.

The Knight thought it would be an interesting sight. Maybe they and Quirrel and their Someone could go and see it someday.

They nodded decisively and stood up from the bench, patted Quirrel goodbye on the knee, and turned to go.

“Bye then, traveler. Take care.” Quirrel called after them.

And so the Knight descended into the heart of Hallownest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They had to get to the City of Tears eventually, right? This might be the last "set-up" chapter, per se. After this their story diverges in a fairly significant detail that proves extremely useful, and, coincidentally, facilitates the comforting.
> 
> Also, the only reason the exact number of chapters is ? so far is because the math to decide how it all fans out is a little inconsistent for me, and I'd prefer the chapters to be more events than specific wordcounts. My guess is between 25 and 30 but honestly, who's to say. I'm excited to get to my favorite parts!


	6. Of Forgotten Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Knight is granted an ally and a gift in one fell swoop, and finally has a face and name to put to a voice.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : None.

They climbed down the tower and began to wonder where exactly they would find Hornet, as they took one elevator and then another deeper and closer to the foot of the city.

She hadn’t exactly given them a landmark to look for, and the Knight was beginning to be intimidated by the sheer scale of the city they might have to search through to find her. The fact that it was very much raining, and from Quirrel’s reckoning, would continue to rain until the City itself wore away was also not lost on them, and the Knight wondered if they should just wait for her once they were technically where she’d told them to be, preferably under a roof.

At last there was a final lift that took them out into the chilling air, frigid and still and saturated by the constant rain. The Knight was not one overly bothered by temperature, but cold wasn’t the extreme they preferred if there had to be a choice. They waited at the bottom, staring out into the rain and feeling stray drops land on their mask and mist their cloak.

“Did it occur to you,” Hornet intoned past the constant splatter of the falling rain, “That in delaying meeting me, I might have simply left?”

They looked up and saw her tucked into an alcove in the wall, away from the elements, her white mask glaring down at them like a vengeful spirit.

The Knight watched as she stood up and gave a full body shiver, snapping her stiff joints. She must have been waiting there for a while, the Knight thought, somewhat impressed as she pushed her head to the side with a palm and caused her neck to crackle loudly. Hornet shook her head as though to clear away any lingering discomfort and stared for a moment out into the rain.

“Let’s go.” Hornet said then without preamble, apparently done waking herself up, and jumped down to land without a sound just in front of the Knight.

They watched her as she strode off into the torrential water, the brilliant red of her shawl instantly drenched and fogged behind it. Without any other instruction, they followed helplessly behind and were soaked through. And if it was uncomfortable for them, the Knight thought as they watched her stride purposefully down the abandoned streets, how bad must it be to be a creature who felt the cold more keenly?

But Hornet kept walking without turning off into any of the side streets or open doors, so the Knight kept following.

They covered what must have been half the city, following Hornet through always the widest road of the many that wound off of it, and though the drum of the rain on their mask was soporific they thought that enough time had to have passed for them to walk across the entirety of the Crossroads, and half again if they were really moving fast.

The towers rose like cliffsides, gleaming and unbroken, all around until suddenly the Knight was brought to a gap in the looming structures reaching up towards the roof of the cavern, their heights invisible past the dripping rain that filled their eyes when they looked up and had to be shaken out.

It was something like a courtyard, or a city center, though it was only the deferential space afforded to the structure in the middle that gave them that impression. From what they could see there was nothing else to make it somewhere attractive to a crowd, the towers all with their backs turned and their entrances elsewhere, the cobblestone bereft of signposts or anything but the lumafly lamps glowing determinedly against the press of the rain.

And there in the center was a statue. A monument, the Knight realized, with a sign in front. They looked up at Hornet, who had stopped nearby, and saw she was watching them closely, her shawl tucked wetly against her thin body, eyes narrowed in the rain. They could see she had her arms crossed under the fabric, and hoped she wasn’t too cold.

“Read the sign.” She said quietly, such that they only just heard her past the downpour.

The Knight stared at her a beat longer, concerned and curious and hoping that this wasn’t all the direction she was going to give them, and looked back to the monument.

It was of a single figure draped in a thick cloak, standing on a decorative pedestal streaming water, cornered by three shorter figures facing it with their identical blank masks. The towering stone bug stood tall, but with its face turned down humbly. Its graceful horns arched high above them, creating an imposing silhouette against the grey.

The sign below it read, “Memorial to the Hollow Knight. In the Black Vault far above. Through its sacrifice Hallownest lasts eternal.”

The Knight’s void ran still and frozen. They looked back up at the figure with renewed, desperate interest, cataloguing every detail. It was _them_. Their Someone. The one so dear who had called them from the wastes back to help, and now the Knight could put a face and a name to the voice.

The Hollow Knight. How laughable similar to how they referred to themself. Still, they thought, it wasn’t as though ‘The Knight’ was written in stone anywhere. Perhaps they would take an actual name, someday.

And then the rest of the placard’s words clicked into place. Sacrifice. Oh, but the Hollow Knight had not wanted this. They couldn’t have, they were hurting so fiercely, they were so tired. The Knight knew this very well, could recall the pain as though it was their own.

But then, this monument had to be as old at least as the fall of Hallownest. It had to have been designed, carved, and erected before all of the artists had died. And the Knight also knew well that much could change in time.

If only they could remember why they cared so deeply.

“The Hollow Knight is your birth-cursed sibling,” Hornet said from behind them. “And mine. We share a father, though my mother was Herrah the Beast, Queen of Deepnest.”

“I have been watching you, little ghost.” She barreled on as they reeled. “You do not behave as a creature of flesh and chitin, but you do not act as a hollow Vessel. You do not truly sleep. You do not eat. What emotion you have, and you must have them, you do not express unless you intend to. Yet in spite of the cruelties inflicted upon all of your like, you are kind.” Hornet said tensely.

“There is no other explanation. If you were only here to act against that which plagues our kingdom, there would be no need to offer yourself to the benefit of what few people of Hallownest remains. If you were awaiting reward for your actions you have not met it, yet still you are kind.”

“And more importantly, I feel as though my trust would not be misplaced in your hands. For kindness is all well and good, but useless without ability. You are a stronger opponent than ever I have faced, and a fierce, merciless combatant. And so my trust is that you will not prove too weak to shoulder this Kingdom’s burdens. Do not prove me wrong, or I shall deal with you as I have dealt with the weak and bold before.” Hornet promised grimly.

“Sibling-mine, little Ghost, you are an adversary worthy of respect and a friend to my people, and I cannot withhold my aid without forfeiting my own purpose. You have will the likes of which the Infection cannot breach. I give to you my alliance, and hope that you will use it well.”

Hornet scowled. “So don’t do anything stupid because you don’t know what will happen. Just ask me.”

The Knight stared at her and processed her words carefully. Then they opened their arms and took a step closer.

Hornet took a step back. “No.”

The Knight followed with another step.

Hornet retreated again. “I don’t hug.” They heard what might be hesitance in her voice.

The Knight didn’t follow her again, but waved their arms some to express that they were ready when she was.

Hornet, a safe distance away, scowled. “I do not hug, Ghost, and I’m not starting now. Besides, we’ve been out here too long. Come with me.” She gave them a last narrow-eyed glance, like they might tackle her when she turned her back, and strode down a side-street.

The Knight shrugged and lowered their arms beneath their cloak, and followed.

This time Hornet seemed much more relaxed as she led them through the city, and though she still held herself proudly, her head dipped just a touch lower and her movements were less jerky and precise. The Knight hoped it wasn’t because she was becoming exhausted and chilled by the cold.

It wasn’t a long walk before she led them into the foyer of an open building, and up a single flight of stairs. She opened a door and nodded them inside, closed it behind her, and began to tend to a dusty fireplace.

“I apologize for dropping all of that on you standing out in the rain,” She said stiffly over her shoulder. “I needed to tell you before you came to your own conclusions, and,” She hesitated, “And I didn’t want to wait to see if you would despise me afterwards.”

The Knight came and sat by her as she expertly coiled fragments of once-rich fabrics into a passable pile of fuel and withdrew a piece of flint from a little bag at her flank, hidden by her shawl. They tapped her on the shoulder and tilted their head in question when she looked over sharply. Why would they despise her? They knew her from somewhere before, and though the details weren’t precise, they told the Knight to trust her judgement.

It would be a little hypocritical if they only started to question their intuition _now_ , too.

“What, did you think I didn’t care at all for the impressions of others? I do what I must, and I do care. These things are not mutually exclusive.” She struck at the flint a little more violently than strictly necessary, showering the fabric pile in sparks. It didn’t light.

That wasn’t what they’d meant, but they had been under that general impression, yes. This made more sense. They felt themself soften towards her, sympathetic. Their sister (and such a strange thought that was) had been alone as long as they, perhaps. Where they had had no greater purpose to tie themself to, Hornet had been the lone defender of a kingdom sickened and killed for the turn of an age.

It had to be lonely. It had to be painful, to watch your home turn ill and die, and be alone and able to stop none of it.

The Knight shook their head and tilted it again.

“Why would you despise me, is that your question?” Hornet ventured quietly.

They nodded.

“Why wouldn’t you? It has been part of my duty to keep the Hollow Knight safe since it was sealed. How many of your,” She sighed. “How many of our siblings have come in the way of that? I have blood on my hands, Ghost. I am not a kind person. I have never been allowed to be, and that is no excuse.”

And suddenly they remembered her.

Hornet had been much smaller than she was now, only just taller than the Knight when they counted her horns. Her needle had been barely more than a dagger, sharp but small.

They had escaped something (something cold, something horrible), and there she was, surrounded by the dark and the chittering, so frightening back then, the Knight so young they were scarcely a knight at all, weaponless, terrorized by a world they couldn’t comprehend, hungry and tired and so close to the tipping point of what they could face.

Her face was pale-white and round and her eyes deep and black and rounder. Their sister had saved them before they had known what it was to be saved.

The little spiderling had told them her name and asked theirs, and they didn’t remember anything afterwards but faint flashes of places and sound. The shriek of voices in the darkness, the resilience of web under their hands. The gleam of red thorns, wicked sharp and longer than their arm. Hornet murmuring, telling them to hush as something passed a dark shadow overhead and they couldn’t move against her word. Their hand in hers as she chattered to them and led them past lakes and rivers that hissed, where the air stung their eyes.

Her hand gripping tighter as the greenery faded away and they could hear a whistling, incessant howl of wind overhead. Her arms trembling as she hugged them tightly and they hugged back, and they trusted her more than anything, and she told them to walk into the wastes so they would be safe.

The Knight remembered, and they wanted so badly to tell her they remembered her when she was young and had no reason at all to help them, they realized now, up through the depth of Hallownest.

She had done cruel things, but so had they. One did not go through life without regret or mistakes. If they could do anything but forgive her was a question for another day.

Hornet had in the meantime started the fire, burning bright and warm in the grate, and now she stared into it as it slowly ate at the threadbare fabric.

The Knight opened their arms again, and she glanced up at the movement. Hornet stared at them piercingly. She cocked her head and her shoulders lowered falteringly. Maybe they were clearer now, inside out of the rain. Maybe she saw something in their blank face.

“You’re so familiar.” She breathed.

The Knight nodded, and waited.

“But I haven’t so much as seen a Vessel I haven’t killed in- Not since-“ She argued to them.

“Oh,” She said softly. “I had nearly forgotten.”

Hornet laughed faintly. “I got in a lot of trouble for that little adventure. The Princess of Deepnest, Protector in training, gone out from under their noses for nearly a month. Yes, I caught hell for that.”

Hornet glanced away fondly at the memory, eyes distant as they tracked the flickering of the fire, and then back to the Knight. She scoffed, at herself as far as the Knight could tell, and latched onto them with a hug that was more death-grip than embrace.

The Knight sat still a moment, taken aback. They hadn’t truly expected her to want a hug, not even when they’d offered, and now Hornet threw herself into it all at once. Something blade-sharp and longing and _lonely_ rose abruptly in their chest and the Knight dug their claws into the sodden, thick material of her shawl and buried their face in the neckguard, uncaring of how the wet fabric clung to their mask. Their void lurched and expanded and for once, they didn’t want the feeling to end. They felt warm, because for all that Hornet was cold and faintly shivering and damp, her arms were around them and they felt safer than they had ever been. Their chest felt like to burst and the Knight realized that not all of the damp in Hornet’s collar was from the rain as their eyes stung.

They clutched their sister tighter and cried.

“Missed you too, Ghost.” Hornet mumbled.

She said it like a name, like she’d called them that a hundred times. They’d been given nicknames before, and they’d called themself by what they were, but a name?

It wasn’t a gift they could hope to turn away from. They liked the way it sounded when she said it. Ghost. Ghost of Hallownest.

It had its charms, Ghost thought happily as the tears flowed to stain Hornet’s bright shawl.

Hornet’s grip suddenly loosened and somewhere close to their head they heard her yawn widely. She gave them a last squeeze and let go, and the Knight – Ghost – also loosened their grip as she sat back and regarded the fire. There was a dark smudge on the fabric at her shoulder, which she hadn’t noticed yet and hopefully wouldn’t be too mad about when she did.

“We can talk about everything in the morning. I’ll help you as I can, but know there are things that I cannot do. Sharing my knowledge is not one of them. If you have questions,” She broke off and stared at them with searching consideration.

“Ah, if you have questions, we’ll figure out how to address them tomorrow.” She landed on. “Take your cloak off, we’ll hang it up to dry so you don’t catch anything.” Hornet ordered as she shucked off her own shawl and, in fact, noticed the black spot.

She leveled a steady glare at them and Ghost pretended not to notice, untying their cloak and laying it on the ground in front of the fire grating.

“If this doesn’t come out, I will be most upset. That is a threat. Don’t leave that there, hand it to me.” Hornet gestured impatiently for their cloak, which they meekly handed to her.

She produced a pale line of faintly glowing thread from nowhere they could see, seemingly plucking it from thin air to affix it to a decorative curl of metal above the fireplace and to the wall across the room, and draped both their clothes over it just close enough to the flames to dry in the warmth.

They stood up and plucked at it wonderingly, and she gave a soft, amused huff. “I am born of the Pale King too, little Ghost. I have my own power.”

She strode across the room and opened a chest in the corner, hunting around for a minute to emerge victoriously with an overflowing armful of bedding. She tossed Ghost a thick blue blanket and chose a violet duvet for herself, and Ghost brushed the thought aside to listen as she spoke.

“I have had my qualms with the nobles of the City of Tears since long before they all met their ends, but they put the silks from Deepnest’s people to good use. We may as well make use of it, since they aren’t around to.” Hornet said with a sardonically pleased tilt of her head. “Rest. We will talk of heavier subjects tomorrow.” She informed them.

Ghost hadn’t thought themself very tired, especially since they’d just rested, but with the crackling warmth of the fire and their eyes still stinging from their tears and the softness of the blanket as they draped it around themself and laid down, and the protective presence of their sister already curled tightly into her own bedding just across the room, they felt languid. They were safe here, was the difference, they thought blearily as they settled into the comforter, petting the soft fabric with one hand.

Safe and very comfortable, they thought as they wormed themself into the blanket and thought no more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's a shawl because I say it is and because it's funny. And I mean, it isn't quite in cloak territory really, so why shouldn't it be a shawl?
> 
> But anywho, now is when we discover why Ghost has always trusted Hornet a little too much for some violent stranger they chased through the swamp. Strange how memory works in Hallownest.


	7. Hornet's Tale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ghost is told Hornet's understanding of the situation, and a plan is created. Then a plan is procrastinated upon almost immediately.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : One-sided argument, Hornet's understandably limited social skills, brief half-recollection of painful memories.

It was more alarming than Ghost would readily admit to return to awareness in complete darkness, having pushed their head beneath the blanket at some point. They floundered about until they heard someone protest sleepily and the shifting of fabric, and remembered where they were.

They quickly wriggled free of the covers and retrieved their cloak from where it hung near the fire. It was still fairly damp, but they draped it back around their shoulders anyway. The fire still burned low in the grate, and a glance across the room told them that Hornet was still fast asleep, just a pile of padded purple fabric with two long white horns poking out, with her needle set down nearby.

Ghost watched for a minute or two as the pile shifted minutely with each breath she took, waiting to see if Hornet would wake up. She didn’t, to their growing concern.

What if she’d gotten sick, being out in the cold downpour so long? How could they help?

Oh, food. Bugs ate food, and Ghost could find her some and it would probably make everything much more tolerable. They knew they were drained and tired when their stores of soul were low, so it probably felt something like that to be properly hungry.

Nodding firmly to themself, Ghost slung their nail over their back and quietly left.

By the time they returned they were dripping wet again, but carrying four squits in various degrees of dismemberment, dripping cloudy and diluted orange onto the carpet.

When they kicked the door open, lacking the free hands to do so quietly, they saw Hornet bolt upright and fumble for her needle until she seemed to recognize them.

“Ghost, what the-“ She rasped and cleared her throat. “What are you doing with those?”

Well, their soul had been a nice pick-me-up, but by and large they were for her. Ghost hoped they communicated as much by dumping the leaking bugs in front of the fire, burning down to its last fibers now, and pointing at her.

“What below the earth am I supposed to do with those?” Hornet asked, bewildered.

Ghost wobbled their head in an exasperated manner and mimed eating one of their prey, then held it out to her. One of its wings fell off and drifted to the ground.

“Oh.” She replied flatly. “I’m not hungry.”

It was worse than they’d thought. Surely, only the desperately ill refused food. Ghost wracked their memory to think of what else one did for ailing bugs.

“Listen, I don’t know why you feel like I can’t fend for myself, but I am in perfect health. I don’t know if you know this, but when one eats infected bugs without proper preparation, one typically is no longer in perfect health.” Hornet told them slowly.

“I would not refer to those as… Properly prepared.” She said.

One of the squits without a head fell from the precarious pile with a wet splat. Ghost glanced down at it.

“And now you’re soaked again. Maybe I should be more concerned if _you_ can fend for yourself.” She said sharply, but without bite.

Ghost realized she was trying to tease them and bobbled their head in amusement, mostly glad she wasn’t sick, at least by her reckoning.

“Oh?” Hornet pretended she understood them entirely. “I will take that into consideration, Ghost.”

She looked at them and her expression sobered. “But we have matters to discuss, don’t we? Can you write?”

Ghost nodded, considered, and shook their head. They could, to an extent, but they’d never been taught an entire language. What they had at their disposal was mostly fragments of vocabulary and writing convention, and whatever had been most useful at the time of whatever communication a kingdom had to offer. They doubted that much of what they could write would make sense to anyone else, when it barely made sense to them.

Hornet sighed. “Well, let us lay down the essentials. You have paper and pen, yes?”

They did. They brought it out and laid it on the stone in front of the fireplace, unstoppered the inkwell, and offered her the pen, significantly more tattered than it had been the last time she’d seen it.

Hornet ignored them for a moment as she tested the dryness of her shawl, found it acceptable, and pulled it on before taking the quill and sitting herself down next to them.

“I will write what simple communication I believe will be necessary for this conversation, and you can either point to the appropriate symbol when you want to use it or write it down again.” She said, writing something out with practiced sweeps of ink.

“Later, if you desire it, I will teach you the written language of Hallownest. I am most familiar with the lexicon and writing conventions of the upper class and of the Weavers of Deepnest, but I’m sure no one cares for the difference anymore.” She paused and considered them.

“Writing is all well and good, but there was a language of hands as well that existed in Hallownest’s past. I know none of it, but should I find someone who does, I would be willing to learn. Would you like to know if I find a way to teach it to you?” She added a final dot to a symbol and set the pen aside.

Ghost nodded energetically. How wonderful, a way to communicate sounded to them. How many times had they wanted to say something, to make themself heard, stymied by the lack of a voice? How often would they have been less isolated, if they could have talked back?

They could tell the Hollow Knight everything they had missed.

“Alright, I’ll keep an eye out for anyone with such knowledge. But for the time being, this is the symbol for ‘yes,’ this one for ‘no,’” Hornet began, pointing to the simple symbols on the page as she said their meanings out loud. “This is a version of ‘to elaborate,’ this one means ‘why,’ this one ‘what,’ as in to ask a question, and this is ‘where.’ That is ‘stop,’ and here is what means ‘go ahead.’”

Hornet sat back and nodded in satisfaction. “Is this an acceptable range, or should I add more?”

Ghost didn’t think they could remember any more at the moment, and touched the symbol she’d said meant ‘yes.’

“Good. Should I start more or less at the beginning and tell you what I know of the story, or do you only want the details like an impatient grub?” She narrowed her eyes at them without real irritation.

Ghost tapped ‘elaborate’ firmly and gestured in admonishment even as they delighted in being understood.

Hornet nodded in approval and shifted into a more comfortable position. “Alright then. It begins thus.”

And she told them of old Hallownest, the grandeur and inequity it had held. From her education on the matter as a child of Deepnest, she had been told that Hallownest was an immensely powerful and well-defended kingdom even as they were separate from it. The bugs that made up its citizens were clever and curious and it had multiple institutions of learning and of research, and rumored to exist chiefest among these was the Pale King’s own within his palace, followed closely by the Teacher’s Archives.

It was not a perfect civilization, not by any means, but it was strong and easily sustained and seemed like it truly would continue into eternity.

The forgotten god’s plague had begun small. Harmless. An infection of the mind that dulled its victims, made them prone to forgetfulness and anger, but did no other obvious harm. Its study was diverted to the appropriate researchers and forgotten.

Years before Hornet had been born, it began to grow. In its most severe cases, it crippled the victim’s mind and ate away at their insides. Mortality began to occur in those who were weakened to begin with, and then in those who were unfortunate, and then, by the time Hornet was learning to use her first shellwood nail, in every recorded case. It had no obvious source, no means of transmission. It spread sickly-sweet like slow rot or creeping mold from seemingly random points in the Kingdom, and no one knew how. But it was still a fairly uncommon disease that took a long time to become fatal, and so the panic it caused was slow and mostly among those researching or treating it.

The Pale King finally enacted his first failsafes when it began to eat away, slowly, over months and years, at the people of the City of Tears.

Hornet stopped here and told Ghost, dripping with vitriol, that the King had reappeared with an unforgiving plan; the Kingdom would be closed. The Infection would be discarded without mercy. And the City of Tears would be cut off from even those outside cities and places within Hallownest until it ended.

For a time, it seemed to have worked. But, of course, it didn’t.

It was discovered that the Infection was closely associated with the state of mind of the victim, with dreams and thoughts and wishes. Sometimes, in the last stages of the disease, the dying would whisper of a Her, of blinding warm light that snuffed out their thoughts.

The Pale King was silent for a long time, and returned to a desperate people pleading for guidance to tell them that the Infection would be contained, that they need only wait. And wait they had, all of them, until the day they died.

And this, Hornet told them, was where the knowledge of Hallownest’s people on the specifics ended. She knew the rest of the story only because of the part her mother would play in it, her mother the Dreamer who had refused to leave her in the dark without knowing why she would never wake up.

The King would have a Vessel, one chosen from many of his own hallowed children, who would contain the burning, vengeful light, and it would be guarded by three Dreamers tied to its sealing.

Ghost tapped ‘stop’ repeatedly, white masks playing before their eyes and shifting, living pressure crawling over their chitin, and Hornet trailed off.

They touched ‘why,’ with a careful hand.

“I don’t know why that is what he chose to do.” Hornet said softly into the quiet, nearly drowned out by the gentle patter of the rain outside.

“I don’t know why he chose to create Vessels, or why he had to make so many that I was to cut down those who escaped. I,” Her voice cracked. “I don’t know why he used the Dreamers to keep safe the Hollow Knight, and I don’t know why there was no other option. Perhaps there was. Maybe there were countless options, and this was the one he chose from them. Or perhaps the Pale King truly only saw this as the final means to keep Hallownest from destruction.”

She sniffed angrily and pressed the heel of her hand into one eye, scrubbing at it. “I’ll _never_ know. But it doesn’t matter, because the sacrifices made in the name of the Pale King were all for naught. Hallownest is gone, and my mother is asleep, and our siblings are dead, and it was for _nothing_.”

Ghost scooted closer and set a gentle hand on her trembling shoulder. Hornet have a harsh sigh incongruent with the care with which she leaned forward and bumped the foreheads together and stayed there, a constant light pressure above their eyes. Ghost nudged up at her reassuringly and she gave them a short nuzzle back before sitting up.

“You were a very dear friend of mine. I hope you know that. I hope you might forgive me for many things, and be my friend once more. Wyrm knows I’ve few enough of them, and fewer still that my actions deserve.” Hornet whispered.

“But I can’t allow myself to despair. And I know you won’t, if you’ve come all this way and still find it within yourself to withstand me. It’s… It has been a long time, Ghost. The kingdom eternal has gone quiet.”

Hornet took in a fortifying breath and it was as though she’d never doubted in her life, glaring fiercely at them through dark, unrelenting eyes.

“The Dreamers are Lurien the Watcher, Monomon the Teacher, and Herrah the Beast. If you give me your map, I will mark their locations and lead you to each. They are each a seal guarding the Hollow Knight, if the Vessel yet lives, and only by removing their protection can the Black Vault be breached. I know of a moth within the Resting Grounds who will be able to help you in this. She deals in dreams, which I have never found myself capable of. You will receive her help, given willingly or not.” Hornet told them sternly. Ghost was unsure whether the unwilling party might be the moth or them, and didn’t care to ask.

The seals could be broken, and now they knew how to break them. Ghost nodded resolutely.

“I will accompany and guide you to the best of my ability. Yours is resilience born of two voids, wanderer of the wastes, though you and I both know you are not an empty creation.”

“And what of it? An empty vessel for the Light did not work before, perhaps a resilience of mind and body is more suited to this task, for whatever shape that might take.” Hornet said half-jokingly, relaxing some into her own optimistic words as Ghost watched.

“First, though, I am teaching you to write. And then we shall see about that miserable nail you’ve been carting around.”

Ghost sat still and eyed her. And what, exactly, did she mean by that? It was a perfectly nice nail. It was similar in weight and size to the tooth-blade they had carried before their return to Hallownest, and they were rather good with it. And to be fair, they hadn’t seen very many of its size even if they’d wanted to replace it.

But perhaps she had a point. The tip had broken off shortly before the final descent into the City, and that had seemed like a warning. If both Hornet and Quirrel were individually so sure that their nail was such a miserable piece of work, wouldn’t it be more efficient to take few hours and have it reinforced? Just so that it wouldn’t crumble to pieces in their grip at an unfortunate time.

And to learn to write… The idea made their void bubble in delight. Their only issue was that surely such a thing would take time to learn, more time than they had. Much more than they were willing to take.

They shook their head no.

“No, what? No to the nail? I suppose if you’re truly attached to the crumbling old thing, you can simply get it fortified.”

Ghost put a hand on the pommel of their nail and another on the symbol for ‘yes,’ and then picked up their pen and moved the hand on the paper to ‘no.’

Hornet scowled. “You do know that this is only a step removed from playing charades? Did you change your mind, then?”

Ghost shook their head, and wished halfheartedly that she wouldn’t ask so many questions at once. Of course they knew that. If she had offered to teach them at any other point in their life, they would have taken her up on it without a moment’s hesitation. If she were still willing once they had saved the Hollow Knight, they would spend as much time as it took. But the Hollow Knight was suffering, and that had to come first.

Ghost took up the pen and drew a rough representation of the Hollow Knight as they remembered them from the statue, and tapped it repeatedly.

“Ah, so you are only eager to do what must be done before moving on to more trivial things. I understand.” Hornet said very confidently for someone who did not understand.

Ghost didn’t hold it against her. It was close enough.

“In that case, the Nailsmith awaits. I don’t suppose you have geo?” She ventured.

They did, and brought one out to show her.

“I don’t suppose you have enough to pay a nailsmith, I mean.” Hornet clarified.

Ghost didn’t know how much exactly that was, and shrugged. Hornet gave a half-stifled sigh and glanced away as though calculating.

“Well, I do have some geo accumulated, for all the good it does one nowadays. You can pay me back later.” She said and stood up, walking without further instruction out the door.

As before, Ghost, somewhat exasperatedly, stood up and followed her.

She led them more or less back the way they’d come, ducking through the downpour without slowing down or checking her way, with familiarity born of one who had walked the streets a thousand different ways and remembered them all.

Ghost didn’t see how, because every single road was laid out in much the same way, and all were equally muddled by the rain, and then every walkway and building was the same watery grey as though the city had been carved from a single unimaginably massive slab of dull stone by a singularly dedicated mason. Up close like this it was less easy to see the beauty wrought into the vast, carefully constructed city, particularly when one was standing uncomfortably in its constant poor weather.

And it seemed so empty, Ghost thought as they followed the red flash of Hornet’s shawl with half their attention. An empty, forgotten city, created to be used and lived in and now inhabited by none.

It was a fitting capital.

Hornet turned a corner and before them was the elevator Ghost had met with her at the base of, and just beyond that, where she went now, they noticed there was a carved hall for which the only distinguishing feature placing it apart from a hundred or two they’d already passed was a small, plain nail affixed to a post of shellwood, its tip pointing inward.

They hurried after Hornet out of the rain and down the hall. It was short, and at its end there was a steep path, and atop that, resting on a cliff overlooking them, Ghost could see a squat little dwelling with smoke curling sluggishly from its roof.

Hornet stopped short, to Ghost’s surprise, and shook herself vigorously, splattering them with water. Her shawl still hung heavily over her shoulders, but her mask was now only damp instead of dripping. She glanced back at them and giggled at their affronted stare.

Not even an apology, Ghost noted. They would remember that, when next she was trying to skirt a deep puddle.

For now they bided their time and followed her up to the Nailsmith’s home.

Hornet ducked inside and Ghost followed, and saw a beetle with a curving horn like the Stag’s, though also with a much grander beard, refining a nail over a modest forge.

Interested, they craned around Hornet in the cramped space, mostly taken up with nails of all sizes and qualities, to better watch, only for Hornet to clear her throat loudly.

The Nailsmith stopped their hammering and glanced up dispassionately. They glanced over both Hornet and Ghost as if they weren’t there, outwardly grimacing when they noticed Ghost’s nail.

“What a sorry weapon that is. I don’t suppose you want me to work on it?” He said dully.

Ghost drew their nail with a nod and offered it to him.

The Nailsmith sighed. “Well, it’s broken. You would be better off with another. But if you’re very attached to it, anything can be refined with enough effort and skill.”

He took the nail and weighed it in his hands, beard shifting in what could only have been disappointment. “Not one of mine. Have you the geo to pay for its reforging?”

Ghost nodded again and began the slow process of retrieving all of the geo they’d stashed away.

“Oh. That’s odd.” The Nailsmith commented as one would on an unusually formed mushroom, watching them pull geo after geo from somewhere within their chest.

Hornet made an agreeing noise, and he turned his attention to her.

“A fine needle you have there. Not much I can do to improve it. Kept in good condition, you must know it as well as you know your hatchplace.” The Nailsmith said.

Hornet nodded tersely. “It has served me well.”

The Nailsmith hummed. “I’m sure it has. That’ll be quite enough, little one.” He told Ghost, who without knowing exactly how much he needed had been creating a growing pile on the floor.

“Take about two hundred of that back, and give me time to heat my forge. This one will take some work.” He said and placed Ghost’s nail over the glowing coals.

Ghost wanted to watch him work, but Hornet pulled them outside.

“If he’s any good, this will take time. Come, let’s visit the moth while he works on your weapon.” She told them, already starting to descend back to the city.

Ghost didn’t move.

Hornet turned back and glared at them warningly. “You wanted to hurry; we’re hurrying. Let’s go.”

Ghost shook their head. She might be perfectly comfortable wandering off, but _she_ still had her needle.

Hornet sighed harshly, as though she couldn’t believe she had to explain this. “Ghost, I will let nothing happen to you. We aren’t going far; the Resting Grounds are only just above the city.” She barked like she was giving orders.

Ghost sat down and crossed their arms.

They watched her temper blaze for a moment before she visibly tamped it down. They stared at her, and she at them.

Hornet sighed and went to sit next to them, perching on the stone and plucking one of the curious little mushrooms that grew up around the Nailsmith’s hut. She rolled it between her claws, and they sat in silence for several minutes.

“I’m sorry.” She bit out at last.

Ghost looked at her in surprise.

“I admit I have interacted with few without the understanding that I am of higher rank or greater skill, particularly since Hallownest’s fall. Now there is no rank to speak of, and we two are of equal skill. Even if we were not, you are my sibling, and one I have twice-over decided to trust.” She kept her gaze carefully on the mushroom in her hand.

“I value your judgement, and I will attempt to stop and take your considerations into account, particularly since you can’t simply scream them at me when I am behaving as though my decisions are the only ones to matter.” She said, consciously quiet.

Ghost sat in silence for several moments, mulling it over, fondness a solid weight in their chest. Then they leaned closer and butted their mask against her shoulder, startling a jolt out of her. Their stubborn, proud, trusting sister, to notice she was overstepping and give ground instead of demanding their compliance like the kingly blood she shared. How they already loved her.

Hornet exhaled softly like she’d been holding her breath and they felt her relax marginally.

They sat in silence for longer than Ghost had expected. They nudged her and tilted their head questioningly towards the path down.

“We are waiting for your nail. That is what you wanted, yes?” Hornet offered casually.

Ghost nodded, and brought out a page of map paper and their pen instead, which they presented to her.

“Hm?” She hummed inquisitively, accepting them and glancing over the empty page.

Ghost reached back into themself and withdrew the page of words Hornet had written, setting it between them, and gestured between it and her.

“Ah. Yes, I can do that. Something quick, perhaps simple questions? Or maybe short command words, or responses?” Hornet considered a moment.

“Alright, raise one claw for questions, two for commands, or three for responses.” She decided on.

Ghost, who felt they would have been bouncing in place with delight were they a usual bug, held up a single claw.

And so they passed the few hours until the clamor from the Nailsmith’s hut quieted, and Hornet stood up and stretched with a crackle of stiff joints.

“Alright,” She gasped, leaning back with her arms stretched behind her mask. “That will do for now. I will not be disappointed if you can’t recall every word, but you are a quick study, little Ghost.” She praised.

Ghost preened internally, and externally nodded once.

Hornet huffed a laugh. “And so modest. It’s a wonder no one has taught you everything beneath the earth.”

She turned towards the Nailsmith’s hut as they gathered up their paper and stored it away, cocking her head at the quiet.

“That was fast. Either he is very good, or he has decided that your little blade isn’t worth the fuss.” Hornet said offhandedly.

Ghost ignored her and padded back inside, in time to see the Nailsmith holding their nail to the light and peering at its edge with a discerning eye.

“Oh? How punctual.” The Nailsmith said without emotion, as though Hornet hadn’t been arguing with herself about the complexities of the Hallownest writing system for three hours directly outside his hut.

“It usually takes bugs much longer to come back for their nails. Well, here you are.” He told them and handed it over.

Ghost took it and ran their claws over the blade, shining and whole. It sat in their claws like it was meant to be there, and they tightened their grip in wonder.

“I’ve honed your nail’s edge. You’ll find it much stronger than it used to be.” The Nailsmith explained. “It was a tricky piece of work to accomplish, but I misjudged your nail. It is rather resilient, and takes well to the pressures of the forge.”

Ghost inclined their head in thanks, more than satisfied that they wouldn’t have to be so careful not to break it with the force of their blows, and left.

Hornet was staring moodily at the tunnel back to the City and shifting her still-damp shawl when they emerged. She looked back at them and hummed in surprised appreciation at their nail.

“Nice. He truly is skilled.” She leaned closer to inspect it. “Look at that, you can’t even tell there were cracks. That will serve you better.” Hornet nodded, satisfied.

“Shall we go, then?” She gestured to the path, and Ghost nodded firmly, more than ready for whatever the road ahead might hold.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does it count as futzing around if it facilitates a vitally important, if short, conversation that had to be hashed out to move forward in a constructive way? It's a marathon after all, not a sprint.
> 
> Ghost is a worrier, but though they aren't as familiar with how regularly a normal bug might do weird things like eat and sleep, Hornet isn't an especially good role model to base off of. Together they make a half-functional bug.


	8. The City Plagued

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are perhaps two people who truly remember the City of Tears, and they disagree.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Past deaths mentioned, lots of guilt, past murder, past injustice, Hornet Did Questionable Things

Hornet had been wrong, Ghost thought glumly as they walked for the second day through the City of Tears. The Resting Grounds may have been just above the city, but it wasn’t near at all.

They had dramatically underestimated the size of the City of Tears, even by their initial fanciful wonderment gazing over it from the height of the tower that led down from the Crossroads. The darkened, soaked roads seemed to stretch on forever, twisting and curtained by the falling rain. If Hornet hadn’t been there, guiding them and, to pass the time, narrating what this street had been famous for and the name of that worn-down shop, they thought they would never have found their way across it.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Ghost had traversed their share of overly complicated cities, but it would have taken significantly longer than with a guide.

“This was where the trades of the City hawked their wares,” Hornet narrated to them, half-shouting over the rain. “Mostly carved shellwood in these towers nearest us, but I recall that there was a stalwart ceramics crafter that lived and kept up her craft on the ground floor of, let me see…” She trailed off and scanned the identical smeared outlines of the nearest buildings as they walked by them.

“That one over there,” She exclaimed and pointed it out with a dripping claw.

Ghost peered closely in the direction she indicated, then glanced unsurely back at Hornet.

“What? It’s not so very difficult to learn one’s way around.” She defended. “At least, one gets a feel for the place after a decade or so.” Hornet amended with a dismissive wave of her hand.

“Though I suppose I had an advantage there, once the Infection truly started to decimate every city within the borders and some time after the stasis began. I was the only Protector remaining, and I could not leave an entire city to its own devices, even a closed one.” She said, her voice too casual to be truly unaffected.

Ghost tugged on her wet shawl and, when she glanced down with a distant look in her black eyes, tilted their head questioningly at her tone.

Hornet held their gaze for a moment and her eyes hardened, though Ghost felt it wasn’t directed at them, in a way that felt less angry and more bitter. Regretful.

“Maybe one day I will tell you of how Hallownest came to be so empty. You have only seen it when there was still hope to be lost, and then once it had been long hollowed out. Let it be known only that between those two instances the people of Hallownest suffered, and their ends were not quick.”

She took in a deep breath, and then let it out, never breaking her stride. “But that is unimportant now, and those people are long since gone.”

Ghost let go of her shawl and walked beside her in silence for another half hour or more before she spoke again.

“We are coming upon the end of the artisanal district now, and entering into the part of the city that, historically, housed nobility. Would you believe that the nobles persisted until the very end, for the most part? They must not have had strong dreams to foster the illness.” Hornet said unkindly. “Perhaps they should have been the vessels for the Infection. They were certainly deserving of it, by then.”

Ghost looked up at her sharply, but she wasn’t looking at them, staring ahead, her expression unreadable. “I had a hand in their eventual demise, actually. Not only me, but if I am Protector of Hallownest, then they were as harmful to it as the Infection. Bugs died for their ignorance and fear and mindless cruelty, and Wyrm knows that if I hadn’t acted, many more would have broken their shells upon the guards’ greatnails to try for it themselves.”

Ghost looked away, nodded once. The idea of intentionally inflicting the endless, cutting strain the Hollow Knight had been burdened with on anyone at all was one they shied away from, but there was little they could do, and even less reason to make a fuss about something that had happened centuries before, in a context Ghost would never fully understand.

The sort of situation she spoke of didn’t sound unfamiliar to them, though; Ghost had seen enough kingdoms riddled with injustice to know that she was probably right, that those bugs dying in a plague-torn, sealed city would demand the cost exacted upon those even partially responsible.

And Ghost quickly saw what she’d meant by her emphasis on ‘guards’ when they came upon the first finely decorated street, more even and narrow than those in other parts of the city but with doors flung open in many of the buildings, displaying spacious and richly ornamented indoors, where Ghost had to guess most citizens of the City of Tears spent their time anyway.

Pacing endlessly in front of a few of them and up and down the road were a sparse handful of massive bugs, hulking and immense, their armor polished to a dull shine by the endless rain. They loomed so tall that the sight of one down the street nearly startled Ghost, momentarily convinced that it was only feet away from the sheer presence its bulk, moving much more smoothly, as though all its joints were filled by the rain above, than anything that size had a right to.

It was no wonder Hornet had had to take them into account when they’d been alive.

Ghost felt almost ridiculously grateful for the distraction, both from the somber conversation and from the monotony of the City. They didn’t like how withdrawn it made Hornet to talk about, and they despised how even they could tell that the topic made the fierce Protector despair. It didn’t seem like her to regret.

They glanced up at Hornet and she nodded down at them. “These are much easier to deal with now that they’re dead, but their shields are difficult to get past even now. Care to test your nail?” Hornet challenged, a gleam in her eyes.

She drew her needle and charged the one trudging down the street towards them. As Ghost watched, it only seemed to take notice when she was right on top of it, and by then it was too late.

Hornet leapt neatly over the thing and struck a taunting blow against the shield raised to deflect it, to which the husk-guard responded by lashing out blindingly fast with its own great nail. Hornet was already behind it and throwing her needle with pinpoint accuracy into a gap in the chitin plating on its back with a muffled snap like the fast give of brittle metal under force, and when she hauled her weapon back it was followed by a gush of molten orange.

Ghost drew their own nail as it wheeled around and lashed out again, catching on to her tactic and rushing in to deliver a vicious slash of their own that, while it had little of Hornet’s refinement, had the force to cleave a neat-edged gash in the chitin just below Hornet’s mark, from which bright orange spattered and was quickly rinsed away by the rain. Ghost ducked back out of the way of its swinging greatnail just in time, feeling the enormous weapon displace the air just before their mask and the drops of water it flung at them.

They absorbed the soul their blow had displaced, cold and invigorating, as Hornet shouted encouragement over the rain, and Ghost heard the crack as her needle struck true again.

The husk-guard was quickly torn apart by the two of them, as what would have been a trial of patience and waiting for a single knight was made nearly too easy by tag-teaming the thing, helped along by that the dead bug could never catch on to their trick. Fortunately, the others of its like up the street seemed to have no inclination to notice or care to involve themselves in the fight, occupied as they were with marching up and down their chosen stretches instead.

“Here,” Hornet said, barely winded, when it was done and the massive corpse’s eyes had finally flickered and died. “Into this building. It served as the main complex for high-society gatherings, and it is connected to much of this side of the kingdom. And we can get out of the rain at last.” She said, raising her arms and dropping them to her sides to express how little she appreciated her drenched shawl.

Ghost followed her into a beautifully decorated tower, more open than most any other they’d seen, and generously coated in dust over nearly all of the delicately carved furniture and floor. Hornet made a grateful hum as she stepped in out of the wet and immediately pulled off her shawl, which she wrung out carelessly onto the once-polished floor of dark stone, so smooth Ghost’s claws could barely grip its surface.

They followed her example and then padded cautiously after her as she made a beeline to a grand fireplace at the far side of the room, listening with interest to how their claws clicked against the floor.

“I’d go upstairs and poke around for something to eat, but I wouldn’t dare consume anything this place has left,” Hornet said wryly, and Ghost got the feeling that there was more to that tale than they knew.

They cocked their head curiously, but Hornet waved them off, so instead they busied themself tearing down the most patchy and threadbare curtains they could find to toss on her quickly-growing fire.

“Thank you,” Hornet said as she took the pile of old fabric, heaped higher than their horns, from their arms. “One would think after all this time, much of the flammable material in these places would be used up. I don’t know if the fact that there’s so much left speaks more to how few there are to use it, or to the immeasurable size of the city.” Hornet mused aloud to them over her shoulder as she tended the flame.

Ghost stared at her a moment in case she followed that up with anything else, though instead she only sat down before the fire and sighed. She seemed smaller than usual, to Ghost, but they weren’t sure if that was because the black of her chitin blended nearly too well into the dark floor beneath her, or if perhaps she was hunched more than usual, curling slightly into herself. Ghost nodded, though she couldn’t see it, and left to explore the building some.

She seemed like she could use a moment alone, to relax where she felt she wouldn’t be watched or judged if nothing else.

Ghost wondered what she had done, to feel so strongly about it even all this time later. They hoped that she knew that they wouldn’t care.

They had decided to trust the Hornet of now before they’d even remembered her, and that included her history. Whatever it was, it mattered less than having their sister back, and of that Ghost was certain.

They quickly found a huge staircase that, when they climbed the steep steps, split off to lead to what they could only assume to be different wings of the expansive building. Ghost chose one at random and found themself walking down a hall that looked exactly as though it would have housed bugs who thought themselves of the highest importance, and sought to have that reflected in their surroundings.

If to look out over the City of Tears was awe-inspiring in the skill and dedication it must have taken to build it, the nobles’ quarter was a nearly depressing display of that skill gone to excess. Ghost, who was typically one to appreciate nice things when they came along, found themself awkwardly pacing giving, padded floors and walking past extravagant drawn curtain after curtain, muffling the pounding of the rain they had begun to grow used to. It felt nearly suffocating, all of the finery and softness, particularly compared to the rough-hewn but functional standard Ghost had come to expect from Hallownest, having seen it in every other corner of the kingdom they’d explored.

Above them, lumaflies blinked dimly behind pinkish crystal containers strung elaborately from chandeliers of identical and incredible craftsmanship, obscured by dust and age. They cast a soft glow down over the red, faded fabric that lined the floors and walls that made them feel like the rooms, too, were suffocating.

Ghost turned abruptly into a random room and was taken aback, and then delighted, to find it was lined with shelves and shelves of writing. And then they were downright gleeful once they remembered that Hornet would be able to read each and every one.

A journal was like its own little mystery, in Ghost’s mind, just as hard to explore as a treacherous cranny but with a thousand times the variety. There was only so many things one might find lying around outside, but writing might be anything at all.

And if they had their way, they’d bother Hornet until she told them what was in this one in particular.

They picked up one of the carved half-shells from the shelf nearest and found it closely engraved by neat, if cramped, handwriting. Another shelf held still more, these written in equally cramped but less neat writing in white ink. Ghost took a handful from each shelf and shoved them into their chest eagerly, to be translated later. They were sure Hornet would be pleased to not need to write down every glyph she wanted to teach them as she remembered it, and could instead pick apart whole sets to explain.

Just as they’d picked out some particularly pretty examples from the second to last pile, they felt the ground below them sag. Ghost shrugged it off, attributing it to the ancient padding, and reached for another tablet.

The floor gave way entirely and they were left scrabbling at tearing fabric as they fell through, but their claws couldn’t find purchase in the weak material and Ghost found themself falling.

And in another moment, they had landed heavily on a piece of furniture with a muffled crack and quickly sunk their claws into the lacquered shellwood before they could fall any further.

Ghost heard, from just before them, a startled “Oh!”

They shook their head to throw off the disorientation and glanced up to see a bug, that they immediately noticed both was infinitely cleaner than most they had encountered within Hallownest and was staring directly at them with wide, dark eyes.

They were wearing very elaborate and clean clothing, Ghost thought as they stared at each other, and very pretty.

“What a surprising little grub you are, falling in from my ceiling. It’s not often I receive visitors, nowadays.” She said with a high note of the sort of pleasure one typically feels when they realize an unbelievably fortunate coincidence is tossed into their lap, and the sort rarely associated with little strangers falling through one’s roof.

There’s a first time for everything, Ghost thought and noticed they were perched awkwardly on the back of a couch, and climbed down to both pretend they hadn’t put a few new scratches into the dusty furniture and stare up at her properly.

“Hm, I’d say I hope my manners are still intact from so long ago, but a daresay you’ve blown convention out of the water with your… Curious entrance. Well, at any rate, I welcome you, little visitor.” She nodded politely at them, and Ghost nodded back.

Before they had finished, she was speaking again. “Oh, you’re quite the lucky one to meet me, of course. I’m renowned among the upper caste, don’t you know.” She faltered, and blinked once as though to steady herself.

“Or, I was once. Until those cretins cast me out.” She sneered at her closed door, straightening her posture where she sat in her cushioned chair. “That’s them outside, now, their bodies shambling around all mindless and empty. And here I am!” She crowed and gave a hoarse, triumphant laugh.

Ghost thought her voice must have been lovely once, and put in mind airy spring days and stuffy-scented flowers, and even now it was only age that had coarsened it just enough to be noticeable.

“I’m still alive,” She said with satisfaction. “And I was witness to each one of their pathetic demises. That’s how I got my name, you know. I had a different title once, but I like this one better. Call me Eternal Emilitia, little visitor.” Emilitia told them graciously.

Without waiting for a reply, she glanced over them and spoke again, amused. “In times past I don’t imagine I’d ever speak to one such as you. But then, the rest of my own caste is wonderfully, distantly deceased, and I would have no one to share my happiness with if I were too discerning. So welcome once more, little one!” Emilitia gave another quick chuckle, like she’d made a joke only she truly understood.

Ghost stared at her. So this was a noble, then? They could understand why Hornet didn’t like them, if they were all so strange and condescending. But then, perhaps she would like this one. She was cast out of that caste, after all, and Ghost was curious, if nothing else, about the stories she could share.

Surely Hornet wouldn’t be too worried if they took a little longer getting back to her. Ghost fished out a page of paper and their quill, to Emilitia’s delighted cooing, and wrote one of the glyphs they could remember.

Emilitia gave them a pacifying smile as she took the page when they handed it to her, like a face one might make to a child about to show her something she would pretend to be impressed by, and glanced over it. She made a confused noise.

“’Elaborate’? Elaborate what, dear? Oh, my, do you want to hear of how my old caste-mates met their terrible, unfortunate ends?” She asked enthusiastically.

Ghost nodded, deeply relieved that what they’d wanted to communicate happened to coincide not just with quick understanding, but with such enthusiastic agreement, and sat down on the couch they had scored a few new claw marks into as she clapped in delight.

“Ah, ha ha! How delightful! Oh, it was gruesome indeed! Listen closely, little visitor, I’ll tell you every detail.”

And she did, to Ghost’s increasing fascination.

Emilitia’s tale began somewhat dully, as she related all the official and unofficial workings of the higher castes and spent several long stories complaining of things like “intra-class politics,” and “Pale King-lookalike-wannabes, who certainly didn’t even know _what_ he looked like,” and “those dreadful contemporary artists.”

But then she told them of how her caste had begun to divide during the early days of the plague, between those who wanted nothing more than to close off the Royal Quarter to commoners and keep the Infection at their doorstep and no closer, and those inclined to help the desperate, hopeful people stuck in the same city as them by whatever means they saw fit to.

Emilitia had been part of the second set. “Not because I wanted every commoner out on the streets to live in my bedroom,” She insisted, “like those other fools said of me. I only thought, and still think, that we were in a position to help those less fortunate and, on the whole, we did _nothing_.”

The breaking point had come when she had been discovered, Emilitia told them with bitter resentment, to have been using her own family tower to house those who couldn’t withstand the chill and rain outside, and hadn’t the wealth or connections to get inside anywhere else.

“One is more susceptible to Infection when one’s mind is wishing for a better circumstance for one’s body, we found.” Emilitia told Ghost grimly. “That’s why I’m still here. I wish for nothing, because I have everything I want, now that those ingrates who threw me out of my own tower are dead.”

Emilitia had joined with a group of sympathetic common bugs, to her initial distaste, and had orchestrated her revenge among them.

“And it was marvelous!” She laughed, high and only just too long. “We were so clever, and that red one, what was her name, the little spider. Oh, she was marvelous. I only had to tell her the way into the servants’ passages and the times those royal idiots took their meals, and before I knew it, they were all dead!”

“Well, that’s not entirely true,” Emilitia continued thoughtfully. “It took quite a while. They figured out someone tampered with the food, you see. But the city was closed, after all, so it wasn’t like there was anything new coming in. That spider, she was such a useful one. She brought in plenty for the rest of us, and the royals didn’t even realize!”

Emilitia stopped for a long, hearty laugh, at the end of which she was wiping tears from the corners of her eyes. “That’s the beauty of it, they’d trapped themselves up there! They’d cast me out and locked the door behind, never guessing that things were so much better on the other side! Yes,” Emilitia sobered instantly. “Yes, most all of us out there died as well. Or else, once that clever spider found a way, left. But we could escape. Many of us chose to, of course, but many didn’t. It’s incredible, how long a city can last with every fifth bug falling to the Infection every other day, especially once we all realized it wasn’t moved around by anything but dreams and wishes.”

“I came back here instead, of course I did. I’m of noble birth, only temporarily disgraced. And now,” She succumbed to giggles for several long moments. “Now, I’m the only one! I’ve outlasted every last one of those damned fools!” Emilitia bellowed at the top of her voice.

“Ghost!” Ghost shook off their slightly intimidated awe and looked up in time to watch Hornet drop neatly through the same hole they’d torn in the ceiling, bristling for a fight. Ghost waved happily to her as she seemed to recognize the other bug in the room, disregarding them completely in her surprise.

“Emilitia?” Hornet said in disbelief. “You’re alive?”

“Oh, _Hornet_! That’s your name, of course, how could I have forgotten? Am I to take it that ‘Ghost’ is my little visitor today?” Emilitia exclaimed.

“I… Yes, this is Ghost, my sibling.” Hornet stood up straight and somewhat awkwardly and motioned to Ghost, who waved politely at Emilitia.

“I was just telling them _all_ about what you and I accomplished, back in the day. Oh, don’t you remember? It was such marvelous revenge, and so neatly executed, truly the fruitful combination of our abilities.” Emilitia gushed.

Hornet nodded stiffly.

Ghost got up from the couch and tugged at Hornet’s shawl to get her attention. She glanced down while they hunted around for their map, to Emilitia’s intrigued laughter, and pointed to the once-upper caste bug and then to Dirtmouth.

“Hm? You think she should go there?” Hornet asked. Ghost nodded.

“Go where, dear?” Emilitia interjected, which Hornet ignored.

“Why? She seems perfectly happy down here.” Hornet turned away from Emilitia some and told them under her breath.

Ghost tilted their head at her. She seemed… Regretful, and more on-edge than they’d expect for an elderly bug who had professed to be an old acquaintance of hers.

They suddenly recalled very clearly that Hornet had been unwilling to tell them what, exactly, had happened to the City of Tears, even though she had promised to tell them anything she knew. Perhaps she was worried that Emilitia, who had taken part in the very same event, would tell them something she didn’t want them to know.

The thought filled them with an uncomfortable mixture of guilt and anxiety. Ghost didn’t think their sister could tell them anything that would truly disturb them, and very little at all that would make them think less of her. And, oh, how awful must it have been for her, that she couldn’t speak of it after so long? They were worried for her.

She must have read something like that in their stare, somehow, or maybe her thoughts were filled with guilt, too.

“I only don’t want you to think badly of me for what I did, and what I didn’t do.” Hornet said softly. “I am not a kind person.”

“Oh, my dear,” Emilitia said, her voice hushed. “You saved so many people. Please, please don’t think you ever could have done more than you did.” The old noble had discarded all her slightly manic glee, and Ghost saw she was blinking tears from her eyes and clutching delicately at the front of her dress with earnest, frail claws.

“Not one bug would have made it out of the City alive if not for you.” Emilitia stood up, grunting softly as her joints clicked stiffly from the effort, and hobbled over to take one of Hornet’s hands in her own. “Everyone knew so. And I count you still among the dearest of my friends, young one.”

“I have killed more than you know. I have done things that were necessary, and that haunt my dreams.” Hornet said lowly, but did not take her hand back.

Ghost’s void twisted in their shell at the tense distress in her voice, resigned and closed-off but choked anyway, and they finally wrapped their arms carefully around her waist, about as high as they could reach, and pressed their face into the now-dry, warm fabric of her shawl. Hornet’s entire body was shivering and tense, and she was breathing too fast.

Hornet gave a shuddering inhale and Ghost saw her grip Emilitia’s hand tightly. She stood like that, breathing deeply but unsteadily, until her shaking slowed and then stopped, and her breathing evened out.

She took a last, bracing breath, and looked up to meet Emilitia’s concerned, glinting eyes. “Would you like to come back with us to the atrium, where we are staying for the night? We have a fire, and I’ve found food from the artisanal district. I had time to while you were,” She glanced down at Ghost. “Entertaining my sibling, I assume.”

“Of course, dear, let me grab some blankets. I’ve got a nice bottle of aged aphid’s nectar from the Greenpath herd around still, and I think we all deserve something nice this evening, don’t you?” Emilitia said, releasing Hornet’s hand with a final reassuring wobble to poke through the piled pillows in a corner of her room.

“You only want an excuse to indulge.” Hornet quietly accused, belied by the accepting, if tired, tilt of her head.

Ghost looked up at her and Hornet craned her neck to look down at them. Ghost saw that her eyes, too, were shining with unshed tears, but Hornet only huffed in disbelief and settled a careful hand on their mask, between their horns, and scratched gently for a moment.

She made as though to speak, and instead wavered and swallowed down whatever comment she was going to make. Instead Hornet only looked away to watch Emilitia totter about her room, having never stopped talking about nothing at all, and kept up the slow brush of her claws over Ghost’s head, never hard enough to scrape.

Ghost rested their forehead against her side and listened to Emilitia talk and to the faint sound of claw on chitin, and hoped again, fervently, that their sister knew they’d never hate her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hornet says eat the rich. But not really, because they're probably poisoned. Y'all remember that room in the City of Tears that implied the bugs there ate bad food and died from it? I just thought that was interesting.
> 
> I have a lot of thoughts about how witnessing the fall of Hallownest start to finish must have been like, and what Hornet, who is canonically apparently interested in little else but protecting her kingdom, might have seen and done. It's really a wonder she's not more ruthless than she is. Maybe I'll write that next?
> 
> And thank you so much to everyone who's commented. I've been very nervous about posting any of my work for years, but I haven't gotten a single rude word from anyone. I apologize for not responding to any, it takes a few business days to pluck up the courage, so this is my blanket, heartfelt thank you. I appreciate every single one very much. I keep rereading them and grinning like a dumbass. Y'all are great.


	9. Test of Resolve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Forgiveness can come difficult, and moreso when it's yourself you're trying to forgive.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Anxiety attack, misunderstanding, Hornet is Not a nice person sometimes

Afterwards, Hornet seemed calmer, at least to Ghost.

There had been a tension in her that they hadn’t been able to see, a stiffness to her voice and a distance she’d kept from them, turned away in some intangible sense that only now could they understand had been born of long-held regrets.

Now they made their way through the depths of the Royal Quarter, thankfully almost entirely connected by covered walkways or by towers directly attached to each other in a single sprawling shared lower floor. Hornet walked in silence through the dismal halls, their lofty heights spiraling far above and dark with too few lumaflies. The almost luminescent white of her mask gleamed dully beneath what lumaflies did remain captive in their fixtures when they passed beneath one, scrubbed and pristine after days beneath the unrelenting rainfall. Ghost considered her as they padded along after, even the hard, driving rain only a distant echo as far as they were from outer wall and ceiling both.

“I think Emilitia knows some hand-speech.” Hornet said apropos of nothing, her voice sharp and cutting through the gentle darkness, the blanketing silence, and startlingly cold for the innocuous nature of the statement.

She didn’t make any move to address the thought to Ghost, or to look for a response, so Ghost only watched her as she stalked through the silent, empty city, their sister hard-edged and alive and brilliant among the muted decay. They walked on for some time more before she spoke again.

“We could go back. Stay in the City until you’ve learned all she can teach. Read through all the libraries, all the countless collections of writing from every conceivable aspect of Hallownest’s history. I could teach you to write.”

She didn’t seem done talking, and she walked with no hesitation or indication she might actually turn around, but Hornet’s suggestion had felt unsettlingly genuine. Ghost continued to watch her and beat down their growing alarm, that frantic little voice that cried out at even the thought of leaving their sister behind who they had only just reunited with, after being lost and alone for so long they’d nearly forgotten her in the first place.

Ghost was a loyal creature, they knew this of themself, and now they were realizing they were also one who would do nearly anything not to return to their life in the wastes beyond the Kingdom. The loneliness, now that they knew the friends and companionship they could have here, would be too much.

They had been so isolated, and they hadn’t even understood how unbearable it had been. Ghost thought of Hornet’s lilting giggle and the pleased squint of her eyes, and the way she had listened to them, truly listened, and most starkly of how wonderful it was to have a dear friend to rely upon, to fill the silence and to simply wait beside them, a solid, constant presence.

If Hornet decided to turn back and asked Ghost to come with her, Ghost might accept, and then they would never forgive themself.

“It isn’t as though the plague hasn’t all but run its course,” Hornet said and tilted her head up to survey the detail of some faded mural as they passed it, somber and crumbling and half-shaded by loosely drawn curtains. “You and I, and I daresay most all others who still draw breath within the Kingdom’s bounds, we are not in any rush. If the Infection could have killed us, it would have already. What is to stop us simply taking our time, preparing fully, so that when we do make a move to eliminate it, we’ve every advantage we can muster?” She mused aloud, and Ghost could hear the unsaid ‘but,’ and listened for her to continue.

Ghost sped up to walk alongside her, claws tapping fast against the smooth floor to keep up with Hornet’s long stride. She glanced down at them and Ghost saw there wasn’t hesitation or offer in her gaze, but cold calculation. All at once, she looked like the merciless combatant they had met and fought in Greenpath, and like the Princess who had, for a city of dying, doomed people, made sacrifices unknown to them that still stalked her bloodied dreams.

“But we won’t do that. We will press on and throw ourselves at every challenge, and there will be many, that your path will lead us to. Because you aren’t here to save my kingdom, are you, little Ghost?” Hornet said.

It didn’t sound like an accusation, but it still threw Ghost off the worn path of ‘what-if’s their mind was racing down. They tilted their head just slightly to indicate they were listening.

“If you were here to save it, you would have come when there was still something to be saved.” Hornet said flatly, and had Ghost been of flesh and hemolymph they would have flinched from the resignation in her voice, and from the absolute lack of blame in her eyes.

Logically, Ghost knew that they couldn’t have known what the fate of the Kingdom of Hallownest would be when they left it. They’d hardly known there was a plague at all, they _still_ couldn’t remember what had scared them so badly they’d wound up in Deepnest of all places to escape it. Even now they had no plan past unsealing the Hollow Knight and, somehow, rescuing them from the Light they held captive. Ghost wasn’t even certain they wouldn’t doom Hallownest, whatever was left of it, irreparably in the process, however much the thought now made them fear for all those they knew still lived in the ruins and smiled at them when they passed by.

Maybe that was why Hornet’s words hurt so much. They could have saved their loved ones pain and strife, and they hadn’t even been conscious enough of the opportunity to acknowledge it as the long years passed, as Hallownest dimmed and died. They wouldn’t have had to be the Vessel that the Pale King chose, they only had to have been there.

Now it all felt too little, too late, at least for their sister.

“Ghost,” Hornet’s voice, touched with concern, brought them back. She was gripping their shoulders and must have been crouched on the ground, for her mask was of a height with Ghost’s. She looked a hair’s breadth from trying to shake whatever she was frowning at out of them, claws digging into their chitin without the pressure to puncture it.

“Ghost, you’re shaking, you’re,” Hornet peered closer at their face, her eyes dark and gleaming in the low light in a way Ghost’s never would. “You’re crying.” She stated harshly, though even as Ghost resurfaced from their guilt and horrified, dawning regret, they could tell she was only exclaiming in surprise and alarm, however much they thought she ought to be condemning them.

Hornet hurriedly scrubbed her claws over Ghost’s face, too roughly to be gentle, scratching over the hard mask even as she must have been brushing away tears. Ghost felt their void give a jittery, unsettled shiver that caused their shoulders to jolt like a hiccough and fresh tears to drip down their mask, more than Hornet could wipe away.

“Oh. I didn’t mean to make you cry.” Hornet’s voice was hushed as she took both her hands away and sat back on her haunches, gazing at them with wide, dismayed eyes. She looked now very like the little spiderling that had spent weeks shepherding them to safety from the bottom of the world to the top, their sister who they trusted more than anything in the world.

Ghost gave another shiver at the thought of what they had left her to suffer by herself, and though they wanted a hug more desperately than they ever had, they only cinched their arms tightly around themself and dug sharp claws into the chitin of their arms.

Hornet’s head tilted reflexively to take in the small gesture and Ghost heard her take in a deep, preparatory breath, and then all at once she lunged forward and wrapped her arms around them. Before they could properly realize she was hugging them, Hornet gave a soft grunt and lifted them bodily off the ground.

She was carrying them, Ghost thought distantly, hanging limply from her tight grip as she bounced their weight once and then started walking again. They stared over her shoulder, reeling.

“Wrap your legs around my waist and put your arms somewhere less uncomfortable, or I _will_ drop you.” Hornet warned even as she held them a little tighter, as though in defiance of her own threat.

Ghost complied, draping their arms over her shoulders, and something in their chest _ached_ even as the dizzying relief that Hornet didn’t hate them outright washed over their frantic mind. Their shoulders hitched and they buried their face in her neckguard and let her carry them, the warmth of her body, faint as it was, as soothing as it was reassuring.

“You cry in such a strange way,” Hornet said eventually, her voice even and quiet. “Black streaks like the decomposing eyes of a corpse, though the only stench you carry is whatever of the world finds its way onto your person. Is that why it pains me so, to see you in tears? Cold little Ghost, you must not be a bug as I am, but I can’t seem to mistrust you for it.” She murmured like a lullaby.

She held them a little closer. “Do you haunt my dreams, or I yours?” She asked softly, and Ghost couldn’t have said which they found more distressing. Instead, they wormed more securely into her grip and let the last of their shivers fade.

Hornet sighed and said nothing more for a time, long enough that Ghost gave in to the steady, lulling motion of being carried and, in the red-tinged darkness, drifted off.

When they returned to awareness it was to Hornet jostling them awake, which took them by enough surprise that they sunk their claws into her shawl, suddenly certain they were falling. Hornet hissed in pain and they let go entirely, the sound sending a cold jolt of fear through them.

“Don’t do that again,” Hornet advised grimly. “And wake up. This is the elevator to the Resting Grounds.”

Ghost relaxed at the sound of her annoyed voice and blearily looked around as Hornet set them back down on the floor. It was an elevator, certainly, and it led up so far that they couldn’t see where it ended, though the curving glass window looking out over the City of Tears far below followed it as high as the roof of the great cavern the city rested within.

Ghost went to look out the window and saw before them again the vast, densely built City, the furthest towers like thin, clustered pillars against the dark and heavily obscured by the rain. Having laboriously crossed the City by foot they had a healthy respect for just how truly expansive it really was, their initial wonderment and incredulity tempered by equally incredulous respect for whoever had the vision and determination to carve it from the stone.

“Let’s go. The Resting Grounds aren’t somewhere I wish to linger.” Hornet snapped and stepped inside the iron cage, waiting impatiently by the lever.

Ghost stepped inside and immediately she gave the mechanism a hearty kick, and they were ascending. True to their estimations, it was far longer than the ride down from the Crossroads, but once they rose above where the windows and their thin, wavering light ended, Ghost kept expecting it to grind to a halt. Instead, the darkness grew deeper around them, and as the patter of the rain faded entirely, the silence became absolute save the grinding of the ancient metal which seemed to rise harshly to fill the space.

It put Ghost on edge as they waited the long minutes in the dark. A hand suddenly fell on their shoulder and they nearly jumped into the closed lift door.

“It’s me. Don’t worry.” Hornet said beside them.

It wasn’t an explanation, but Ghost thought maybe she was disoriented by the totality of the dark and the encompassing feeling that the world had shrunk down to just them and the elevator too, so they let it pass.

After a few more minutes, Hornet spoke again. “I think we’re nearly there. I can see light.”

Her eyes must have been more sensitive to the change than Ghost’s, because they couldn’t so much as see the iron bars of the elevator. But after a minute more, they noticed slowly that they could begin to make them out once again, dark against black, and then the slowly retreating stone walls around them, and then they emerged over a wrought-iron landing and the elevator stopped.

The doors swung open and Hornet stepped out with a shiver of distaste. Ghost followed with considerably more interest. Without the racket of the elevator mechanisms, the silence felt oddly heavy. The Resting Grounds, or at least the little cavern off of it where the elevator stopped, looked remarkably like the paths winding through the Crossroads, down to the swirling, calcified shells buried in the walls. Far off, they could hear what sounded like labored breathing, drawn out so long and stretched so eerily that it couldn’t have come from a bug, like dying gasps of wind winding irregularly through the stone.

“Come on!” Hornet called, her voice echoing around the silent cave. She hadn’t stopped when they had, and already they’d lost sight of her.

Ghost hurried after her fading footsteps as she led them unerringly through a short, low-roofed tunnel carved more somberly than those in the Crossroads or leading off of the City of Tears, and then into a more open cavern. To Ghost’s piquing attention there was a narrow path leading directly across it, and carved into the stone below their feet were the likenesses of generic masks.

To exist in Hallownest was to walk over uncountable graves, but this was a rather literal take, Ghost thought as they crouched to run their hand over the smooth-worn semblance of a hollow eye socket.

“Don’t touch that, you don’t know who’s walked on it.” Hornet called to them. She was standing nearly at the end of the path, before a staircase that led to a hole in the ceiling, streaming light. Behind her, Ghost saw the shadows twitch.

They drew their nail and sprinted towards her, and taking their urgency for what it was she turned around too, a hand already on her needle, but they were both too slow to catch the winged husk before it rasped a half-remembered battle cry and swung at Hornet with a dully glinting nail.

Hornet rolled with the blow in what would have a half-second sooner been a graceful dodge, but instead changed a fatal wound to a devastating one. She made a choked sound as her shawl bloomed with her dark blood, and Ghost’s world narrowed to a pinpoint.

They didn’t remember how they killed the husk, only the muffling rush of void blocking out the sick, dry cracking of the thing’s chitin and the searing heat of its burning orange insides where it splattered up their nail, onto their hands.

When they looked up, Hornet had dispatched one of the same huge husks that had guarded the Royal Quarter, and Ghost hadn’t even noticed.

She stood off at a distance, head cocked to the side, considering, as Ghost calmed themself and awkwardly resettled their nail at their back.

“I don’t know how I ever thought you weak, but you’re easily distracted. It’s painfully obvious you have never fought alongside another, not when it mattered. We will work on that.” Hornet told them matter-of-factly, in place of most anything else she could have said, as she cleaned her needle, and Ghost couldn’t tell if it was admonition or praise.

Still, Ghost stepped closer and tentatively hovered their claws over her arm. The same arm, they thought with a twist of guilt, that they’d injured when they’d first fought her.

Hornet jolted back as though struck, and Ghost similarly recoiled. They stared at each other in silence for long moments, mutually regretful but unwilling to apologize. It was Hornet, by default, that broke their stalemate. She turned and began to stride up the stairs, leaving Ghost to scramble behind in her wake, wondering helplessly at her sudden discomfort and unable to ask what was wrong. Ghost ruefully thought that perhaps it would have been smart to go back and learn some hand-speak, if only to make situations like this more manageable.

At the top of the stairs, Ghost saw a graveyard.

The sight took them aback, and they took a few steps to gaze up at a gravestone. It wasn’t elaborate, or particularly large, but something about it felt strange. The stone was streaked and dark where water had fallen over it for years upon years, and it arched above them, simple and watchful.

How eerie, Ghost thought suddenly, a graveyard was. It felt almost ridiculous to have one here of all places, in the heart of Hallownest. How many dead had they passed lying on the roads, leaned up against walls, settled in the little hidden places that remained to the Kingdom, curled and stiff and entirely forgotten? Not an entire kingdom’s worth, the City of Tears was too vast for that to be possible, but if Hallownest was a kingdom that valued lives after they had passed, why was the graveyard so small?

They gazed up at the wide curve of the carving at the top of the stone, mimicking a bug’s horns, or else maybe a relevant symbol, and heard Hornet’s careful steps approach behind them.

“There are a thousand reasons a bug might not be remembered in this kingdom.” Hornet said evenly. They looked at her searchingly, but though there was still a slash through her shawl, the silk wrappings underneath hadn’t yet bled through, and if she was in pain, she was making a point to not show it.

“They might have no one who cares to remember them.” She continued as though she hadn’t noticed. “That was the case of many, especially as the Infection often killed a bug and their closest before any of them could be memorialized. They might not want to be remembered. They might have been too inconsequential, even those dearly thought of, for a mason to carve them a stone. They may have never been known at all.”

She paused, and looked over the gravestone Ghost stood before. “That marker says, ‘Cursed are those who turn against the King.’” She added, and turned to go.

Ghost watched the gravestone a beat longer, thinking they saw something flicker in the corner of their eye, before following.

“Some,” Hornet continued as they passed into a second, larger cavern, the nearest and newest gravestones dwarfed by a half-circle made up of three that were particularly large, whose carved stone masks glowed a pale light. “Are remembered too well, though they haven’t yet died.”

Ghost recognized the masks, the same as were carved into the Black Egg, and ran to inspect them. As their hand touched the engraved surface of the nearest, there was a upswelling of power that pulsed along seals lying in wait around the monument.

Hornet drew in a sharp breath, and Ghost took a step back, but not quickly enough.

Gleaming, finely wrought pale lines clouded the air with a dense hum that resonated through Ghost’s mask, and as soon as they established themselves, they wavered and snapped all at once, deafeningly, and Ghost found themself on their knees from the force of the resulting shockwave. Distantly, they heard Hornet shouting. But someone else was speaking to them, Ghost realized as they looked up to see three bugs whose faces matched the gravestones and the Black Egg’s seals.

“What compels its climb out of the darkness? What compels its return to this sacred kingdom?” One said.

“A call from beyond the Seals? By the Vessel, or by that captive Light?”

Ghost looked up sharply at the mention, though their equilibrium swayed in protest. That could only be the Hollow Knight they spoke of, and Ghost fought to pay attention through the pressure that made their vision flicker. They were arguing amongst themselves, and amidst the pulsing force Ghost couldn’t tell which said what. The Dreamers, then. It must be them. They seemed to all but ignore Ghost entirely, even when Ghost forced their head up and memorized the appearance of each in turn.

The bugs floated midair, hovering though none of them had any wings to speak of, and through them Ghost could see the faint shapes of the graveyard beyond. One was a powerfully built bug with regal horns draped in grey fabric, curved in a familiar way. Another, of whom Ghost could tell nothing about how their carapace might have been formed, or even how many legs they had, wore a long, concealing cloak whose tattered ends might have dragged on the ground had they not been hovered in place, drifting in a breeze Ghost couldn’t feel. The final figure that might not have been a bug at all, glowing differently from the pale seals and masks and trailing long, slow-drifting green tentacles. Ghost felt they ought to have recognized how they looked from somewhere far away, but the memory was vague and fading.

“It must be cast away.” One said with finality, and then another, with a rough voice harshened by regret, “Fade away, little shadow. Fade away, and let us sleep in peace.”

And Ghost did fade away. They fought for the moments afforded to them, but for the first time in their life, they were drawn inescapably into true, deep sleep.

And there, they dreamed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ghost has no problems forgiving anyone except when it's themself. They also really, really look up to Hornet, and somewhere deep down they’ve adopted her as more of an all-knowing older sister than they're consciously aware of. So it smarts a little when she's less than tactful. Everyone has their rough patches.
> 
> Here is about where the angst starts to pick up a little, but I stand by that whichever sibling is upset this chapter, the other is waiting in the wings to help them up. Hurt/comfort for a reason. It's a good thing Ghost is such a resilient little bugger. And Hornet too, honestly. She's dealing with some things.
> 
> Also, we have the Dreamers! Finally.
> 
> ALSO! Update pattern will be a little more defined now. Chapters will come in sets of three or so on Friday evenings. This, I think, is a happy medium between finally getting this monster up in its entirety and allowing myself time to write other things. And study, I suppose.


	10. Proof of Resolve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A fate is understood.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Angst, Hornet Is Not Nice but she is Very Concerned

It was like the light of dawn.

Ghost pushed themself groggily to their feet, and thought unsteadily that sleeping felt very much like being awake, for all that it looked a little odd, as they watched a spirograph nearly too bright to look at unfold into existence, spin lazily for a minute or so, and then collapse and fade.

But Ghost had seen many strange things, though that thought was hazier than usual, and so once they had their bearings they gazed upon the dream with wonder. It felt peaceful. Heavy, like rest.

And it was resplendent, this dimly lit place, like every moment they watched there was the hope for something more beautiful to be revealed. The light was like the moments before dawn truly broke, and though the angle of the illumination changed every time they tried to look for what was obscuring the sun, it was softer and more promising, somehow, than the dim light of dusted-over lumaflies. Just like real sunlight, it made the sky turn muted colors that told of rich reds and oranges and pinks and the brilliance of day, if only Ghost were to wait here long enough to see it rise

Something was… Wrong, though. They paced the scant space of the patch of ground, curiously divorced from any _other_ patches of ground that one would expect it to connect to, brushing past dusky red-brown grasses shaped unnervingly like moths’ antennae and bordered on one side by a low wrought-iron fence.

Curled into the iron was, as expected, the symbol of Hallownest. Except, Ghost mused as they peered closer, it wasn’t quite that. It was similar at a glance, but in reality, the metal formed a shape closer to a stylized moth than a six-winged carapace. The discrepancy was enough to alight their fine-tuned instincts to red alert, and Ghost peeked over the platform’s edge for a way down.

Nothing. There was ground below that they could see, and in the distance they saw what must have been mountains, but it was so far off that they couldn’t tell if it was stone, or grass, or a lake shadowed and still beneath the not-quite morning light. It was a much further jump than they’d ever made, intentionally or no.

The fluttering of soft wings nearly sent them careening off the edge, but they recovered in time to see a moth hovering close by. They didn’t speak, but Ghost was more concerned that when a spirograph drifted behind them, it shone through the thin pinkish dawn light of their flicking wings like a leaf held up before the sun. It might not have been a moth at all, just something else cleverly shaped as one, but as it drifted further away new patches of rocky ground formed from rubble after them.

Ghost didn’t know what else to do but follow, and their voracious curiosity might have eaten them alive anyway if not.

So the moth-light led them across the morning sky, through and around fragments of a world. The construction looked like the Crossroads, Ghost thought, but with the same altered symbol as before and with strands of beads and bells in a coppery metal strung from the arched stone. Ghost reached up and batted one, and their claws made a resonant sound against it, the ringing winding lightly through the air.

They’d have poked at it a while longer, strangely fascinated by the elegant noise, but the moth hovered patiently at the end of the isle and it seemed rude to leave them waiting.

Ghost was led to a more intact stretch of stone and earth, upon which sat a statue of a moth that, while far larger than any moth Ghost could imagine, sat low as though sinking slowly through the solid platform where it sat, to eventually fall down into the shadowed, ill-defined world below. The thought made them sad, though they weren’t sure why.

“What a terrible fate they’ve visited upon you.” The moth sighed, her voice distant and as resonant as the bells.

And Ghost remembered what they’d left behind. Immediately, they shook off the daze that had fallen over them, chest tight with worry for how they’d left Hornet and slowly beginning to dread what the dream would mean, if they could never wake up.

But the moth was already fading, leaving behind only an air of loss, and in her place glowed something that spun out those little spirographs, smaller and less bright but so many it made Ghost’s head spin to try and keep track of.

Ghost took a hold of it and the something resolved into a little circular handle that fit neatly into their hand, and when they held it to the light it flared with a nail’s blade.

And the pressure on their mind was back, more debilitating than ever, and Ghost stumbled back from the force of it as the dream-word dissipated like so many wishes.

The first thing they heard when they awoke was Hornet screaming at someone. That Ghost had never heard her be anything but coolly civil, or at worse sardonically cutting, when she was upset before, was their first hazy thought as their other senses returned to them and they began to stir.

Ghost tested the strength of their limbs and was momentarily alarmed to find that there was something wrong with the resistance of the floor, before their sight flickered back on and they saw that instead of the hard stone they’d expected, they were lying on a deep purple pillow, soft and giving.

“- _your_ tribe that have direct contact with dreams, and if you don’t do something about this, I will cut out your eyes and find out if you can _see_ without them!” Hornet threatened, voice harsh with panic, and as Ghost wearily looked up, they saw she had her needle in hand and a frantic brightness to her eyes.

“Ahhh, I don’t think that will be necessary.” An unfamiliar voice hummed. “Look, already they’ve returned to the waking world.”

“Ghost!” Hornet crouched before them and hauled them to their feet, and set about methodically checking that they were intact, tilting their mask this way and that as though to be sure it hadn’t come loose.

Ghost submitted themself with weary amusement to her prodding, and brought up a hand to reassuringly pat one of hers, to tell her that they were alright.

Hornet huffed a sigh of relief, half-muffled, already scowling again. She stood back up smoothly and pointed her nail at the moth that sat on a pile of pillows similar to the one that Ghost woke up draped over. Ghost looked over the moth curiously, preparing themself to intervene as they shook their limbs awake. They felt off, heavy and slow, though as even that quickly faded Ghost decided it must only be part of sleeping.

She looked aged. Her eyes were a cloudy purple and her wings, tucked close around her like a cloak, were tattered and unevenly furred, and looked too crumpled for Ghost to imagine they could ever be used. Her antennae, long and delicate, trembled faintly even as they lifted forward some in interest. The moth seemed astoundingly frail, particularly next to Hornets furious vivacity, even her colors washed out and muted before their sister’s brilliant red and white.

“Tell me what you did to them, before my patience wears thin.” Hornet demanded, already calm and collected once more.

“Not I, Protector. I’ve done very little beyond tending this quiet place for many a year.” The moth replied, her voice as faded and frail as her wings, but resonant in a way that surpassed her aged body. Ghost thought she sounded, in that way, like the moth in the dream.

“Don’t pull that with me.” Hornet scoffed. “I know you’re the last of your tribe. There are no others you can blame for this, none who possess the skill in dream-wielding to capture one within it.”

Ghost sat back down on the pillow and looked to her attentively, hoping she’d go on. They’d never heard or experienced, that they could remember, anything like this, particularly anything as dangerous as being trapped in a dream. Though, they thought belatedly, perhaps they should have expected something like that, with those bugs guarding the Hollow Knight’s seals being called the Dreamers, and all.

Instead, the moth gave a soft, raspy laugh and didn’t answer her. “You may call me Seer, young ones. It is nice to meet you. Let me fetch something to drink, and I will tell you why you are wrong.”

Hornet bristled, but Ghost patted the pillow next to them heavily enough to raise a cloud of dust and for the sound to catch her attention. They motioned invitingly and patted it again, lighter this time.

Hornet sighed, tense shoulders drooping just a hint, and dropped herself onto the pillow beside Ghost, folding her legs neatly beneath her as Seer hummed approvingly.

“Thank you. I’ll be but a moment. Do you take tea with a bit of honey? I’m afraid its quite old, but the Hive’s nectar never truly goes bad, hm?” She offered, raising herself creakily to her feet and tottering over to a wall lined with little carved niches that, as Ghost watched her remove whatever she used to make tea with interest, contained any number of fascinating things and ancient keepsakes right alongside everyday items, like a little pottery tea pot, a rarity in the age of strict necessity Hallownest had fallen under, and carefully bagged clumps of what they could only assume was tea.

“Forgive that it will be rather cold, there isn’t the fuel to start a fire and I’m sure you will want me to tell you all I know, which I’m afraid is at once too much and too little to be of any real use.” Seer said as she set the pot aside to steep.

“What did you do.” Hornet enunciated each word.

“Nothing at all, save to give your little one the means to escape the Dream. Come, little Wielder, show us what you have gained.” Seer gestured to Ghost with a trembling hand.

Hornets annoyed requests for clarification quieted to nothing as Ghost realized they were still holding the little decorated handle of the light-nail in their other hand, hidden under their cloak. They brought it out and looked over it appraisingly.

It was lovely in their dark hand, glinting in the light of the unusually bright lumaflies Seer had strung from the ceiling of her little refuge, and Ghost couldn’t decide exactly what color it was. As they tilted it to catch the light it gleamed just a little too brightly for the lumaflies illuminating it. But what interested them the most was that it was lacking the blinding blade that it had created in the dream.

“If ever my folk had a weapon, it is that.” Seer began. “I’m sure whichever of my ancestors as were responsible for its making must have thought it clever, to forge a nail without an edge, to form an artifact as this that could never harm another, save indirectly.”

“What does it do?” Hornet asked, leaning closer to get a better look. Ghost handed it to her, and as she ran careful claws over the spiraling design it faded minutely.

“It does what a nail does. It cuts. Though this artifact, the Dream Nail, as it is called, the only place its blade might find purchase is in the veil that separates the waking world from our dreams.” She gave a slightly mournful laugh. “I daresay even the Dreamers themselves could not hide from it.”

Hornet’s sharp gaze darted back to her and her hand clenched around the Dream Nail. “And you did not think it _dangerous_ to keep such a weapon all this time? I doubt the knowledge to create such a thing exists any longer, it must be ages old. Did you not consider an instrument capable of rendering the Dreamers’ sacrifice worthless should have been known of when the seals were set?” She accused, her voice dangerously low.

Seer only laughed again, with a note of incredulity. “So little you know of dreams. And how defensive you are! If I were out to set loose the ancient Light upon you, do you not think I would have done so a very long time ago? Or is your ire more personal?”

Seer’s head shifted amidst her thick, fluffy ruff, and her dull eyes met Ghost’s. “Did I not free you from a trap you would never have awoken from?”

Ghost nodded, then reached up to pat at Hornet’s shoulder agreeably. Hornet shrugged them off, something uncomfortably similar to hatred burning in the eyes she never unfixed from Seer’s.

“And where should I have taken it, even if it had been at hand all that time ago? The Pale King? I daresay you know better than most how he treated my tribe.” Seer told her levelly.

“I am beginning to believe that in this, however merciless his actions, his fears were not unfounded.” Hornet replied softly.

“How cruel.” Seer commented. “The moths are guilty of many things, but they did not deserve their fate, before even they could try to right their wrongs. Drink your tea.” She said calmly. “I’m afraid I couldn’t find the honey.”

Ghost looked down as Hornet did, and noticed that two cups of dark, chilled tea had at some point been placed before them. Ghost picked theirs up out of politeness, and Hornet did not.

Finally, Hornet sighed, and some of the rage melted from her gaze. “If you were not the one responsible for the dream my sibling was sealed into, then who was?”

“You may have seen for yourself, Protector. The Dreamers reached out with what little power is still left to them, and they dragged them into that hidden place. They fear you, though they do not truly know why,” Seer added to Ghost. “And they know you are coming closest of any to disturbing their rest, and disrupting their protection.”

“It must be done. The Hollow Knight is failing in its duty. The Kingdom – my people – will not last through its death.” Hornet said harshly. “It _must_ be done.”

“I know it must.” Seer replied gently. “And I am only sorrowful to see that it has taken so long, to take the first step towards redemption.”

She shook her head softly, mournfully. “It is a terrible fate that you seek, little Wielder.” Seer whispered.

That made Hornet take a shuddering breath and glance away. Ghost looked at her, concerned, and then back to Seer, and then to Hornet again as she began to speak.

“I hadn’t wanted to think of it.” Hornet said, and her words were ragged and raw. “I could delude myself into believing there was another way, or focus on the prerequisites of such a choice before it arrived. Do you know, Ghost?” She suddenly turned to them, disregarding Seer completely, and Ghost saw with alarm the faint glimmer of tears in her eyes. “Do you know why it must be a Vessel?”

They didn’t. Ghost also hadn’t allowed themself to consider what might come after, as focused as they were on the call and the plight of the Hollow Knight, secure in the grim, blind certainty that whatever the cost, they would achieve their goal. Ghost shook their head faintly.

“Gods such as she can not be killed, not truly.” Seer murmured. “Only hidden away. Prevented from impacting the world as once they did, though even that is imperfect.”

Ghost looked helplessly between them, and then the events connected in their mind and they fell still. Oh. They expected Ghost to take up the burden of the Infection, and to replace the Hollow Knight. They expected them to stay forever in that cold place where the Hollow Knight had struggled for an age, containing a Light whose deadly anger had already been thoroughly proven.

And the worst part, Ghost thought, was that they weren’t even shocked. As they had learned more of the Hollow Knight and their purpose, the creeping understanding that to free them would exact a terrible price had been growing in the back of their mind. The only surprise was the exact shape that price took.

Hornet swallowed, then swallowed again, and then in a swift movement scooped up her tea and downed it in a single gulp. Then she addressed Ghost.

“Whatever your goal is, is it impacted by your fate? Does the prospect of eternity as captor and captive in turn deter you? Does battle with a god of dreams dissuade you? Speak now if it does.” Hornet said roughly. “And we will go no further.”

Hornet sounded almost pleading, as though without being able to say as much, she hoped desperately that they would be. Their sister sounded so heartbroken under the thin guise of stoicism she wore; Ghost nearly wished they could say what she wanted to hear from them.

But they would never be able to do that.

Whatever the consequences, the Hollow Knight would not suffer. Even the thought of abandoning the sibling they cared for so deeply to their eternity twisted a knife into Ghost’s chest, bringing fresh pain to the open wound that would not scar until they had done what they returned to do.

Ghost shook their head, slowly and deliberately.

Hornet choked on a despairing inhale before them, and then breathed it out and was again hard and focused.

“Alright. Let’s go.” She said quietly, handed them the Dream Nail, and left without looking back.

Ghost stared after her, regretting already that they had hurt her so, and stood to follow, and Seer did nothing but watch them leave from her ancient, lonely home.

Hornet led them back to the elevator in silence. As Ghost ran after her uncompromisingly quick stride they walked through a part of the Resting Grounds they had not seen before, presumably because Hornet had carried them through it to seek Seer’s help, but they couldn’t focus on any of it as they struggled to keep up.

At the elevator landing Hornet paused on the iron leading to the elevator, jutting from the cavern stone like a thorn, and wavered.

She turned back to Ghost, and to their alarm they saw tears running thin tracks through the dust on her face. Hornet laughed wetly at them and scrubbed at an eye fruitlessly.

“What? You might think me stern, but I’m not completely cold.” She said, her voice strained, playing at a bad joke.

It fell painfully flat as Ghost felt their own eyes begin to sting, and at a loss for what to do next and needing desperately to comfort their sister, looking at them as though she herself had consigned them to their fate, Ghost opened their arms, slowly, carefully.

Hornet hiccoughed and sank to her knees, refusing the offer. “You must think me pathetic, mourning someone who hasn’t yet died. I suppose in a way that’s all I have ever mourned.” She bent her head low and away from them and her tears fell onto the iron grating.

“Pitiful. I ought to be the stronger of us, but I cannot even hold myself together long enough to hide in the dark.” Hornet laughed cruelly at herself.

Ghost shook their head, though she wasn’t watching to see it, and knelt in front of her to gently tap their mask against hers.

Hornet’s breath caught, and then it was like a dam was shattered and she _wailed_ , leaning heavily forward into Ghost, who nuzzled firmly back and felt their own tears dampen their face.

There was nothing they could say, nothing they could do but be there for her while she cried, so that she wouldn’t be alone with the consuming pain of another loss on top of all those she’d already felt. So Ghost would stay, and let her push her hard mask into theirs and cry herself hoarse, and give what comfort they could. And they did.

Hornet cried for a long time, until her voice broke and it was only the steady trickle of tears falling to the floor and her ragged breathing that told Ghost that she hadn’t fallen fitfully asleep, her forehead pressed desperately to theirs, and through her mask they could feel her shudder.

Ghost listened to her uneven breathing and felt the press of her mask against theirs, that they were sure would have been uncomfortable to one who wasn’t largely immune to regular wear and tear and the ache of sitting still too long, and waited for her to recover, knowing they would wait forever if that was what it took. It could only have been an hour or less, though, before she took a deep, clicking breath and leaned back.

“If I were stronger, and more selfish, I would never speak to you again.” Hornet said, quiet and rasping as the old moth. Ghost had the sudden urge to get her a cup of water to drink, but didn’t dare leave.

“I can’t help but think it’s already too selfish of me to break like this, when it’s your fate I mourn. But I suppose a support struck twice is more likely to fail. Is it not cruel, that both of those who I have cared for most are doomed to live miserable half-lives I can’t wake them from, and I will always be left here, alive and alone in a dying world?” She whispered.

Ghost realized at that precise moment that their life was not their own. Whatever they had thought, it had always belonged to those they loved, and they would always allow it to gladly.

And so, that was the exact moment when they amended their vow with their old adage. They would save the Hollow Knight, and they would not die, and they would not accept a fate akin to death. Not if it would leave their sister like this. The very thought cemented their resolve where it sunk like ice into their heart; Ghost would not die.

Ghost shook their head and stood up. As Hornet watched them, tired but puzzled, they offered her a hand.

Hornet stared at it a moment, then gave a weak laugh and took accepted it, using it to pull herself to her feet. “You’re terribly determined for one walking to such a fate as yours. Are you telling me you’ve changed your mind, or that you won’t be having this disgusting self-pity?”

Ghost shook their head again and squeezed her hand in theirs, hoping to tell her that they were hopeful instead. There was no real reason to be, but there was no harm in trying, and Ghost had always found that they were an extremely determined person when it came down to it. Perhaps they could pull out a good end for themself, too, in spite of everything.

“Alright, then, I suppose that was unfair.” Hornet sighed heavily, but she seemed less crushed by grief. Whatever she saw in their unmoving face, a little light had returned to her eyes.

Ghost was glad for it. It didn't feel right for Hornet to feel so defeated. 

Hornet closed her eyes and took a deep breath, held it a few seconds, and then breathed it out in a rush and opened her eyes, driven and clear once again, though still damp at the edges. Ghost knew no one could truly recover so quickly, and knew just as well that if Hornet didn't want to say any more on it, she wouldn't.

She considered the narrow space between the elevator and the wall, black and fathomless with the long way down to the City of Tears. “I suppose I have something left to give to you before we journey to the Dreamers’ resting places. At least, there is something you must take, and then somewhere you must see, to know entirely both your past and what awaits you, if you’re so determined to accept what your birthright commands.”

“We’ll go to Kingdom’s Edge and seek the Grave in Ash.” She decided. “And if you will accept it, Ghost of Hallownest, there you will become King.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Geez these kids really do just trade off who gets to have the crisis today. Don't they get tired? The answer is yes.
> 
> Today it's Hornet's turn. Ghost made their peace with "whatever the cost" literally from the beginning, though we'll get to that, but wouldn't it suck to meet your dearest friend again, grow to love them as your sibling, and then abruptly find that, should you both go through with what would save your kingdom, they'll be consigned to a fate worse than death? Probably a little.


	11. To Understand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kingdom's Edge brings up an alarming discovery by the most innocuous means.
> 
> Chapter Warning : Panic attack, angst, hurt/comfort

Hornet ended up having to carry Ghost down the elevator shaft to the narrow little hole in the wall that led to where she wanted to go. They couldn’t see well enough in the dark to find it, and even if they could, the climb down was made that much easier by that Hornet could simply tie a strand of silk to the iron elevator landing above and slide down it, wrapped twice around her hand and again around her leg.

Ghost clung to her tightly in the dark and thought about what she had told them while she concentrated on levering them both down to exactly the right depth.

Was it a preventative measure? Was Hornet taking them to become King to prevent anyone else from doing the same? Given that apparently, if they didn’t find an alternative, they would hold that power forever from within the Black Egg for all the good it would do them, that _was_ a likely outcome. Maybe she was acting out of guilt, and wanted to express that if Hallownest were to be saved, the right to rule it would be theirs more than anyone else’s?

Ghost wasn’t even sure what the convention for passing down the power to rule was in this kingdom. And, given how there had only ever been one king as far as they could tell, maybe no one else was either. Whatever her intentions, Hornet seemed set on it, and Ghost was sure she wouldn’t delay them for anything she didn’t think truly necessary, so they kept their peace.

Not that they could have truly raised any issue they had, if they’d had any. As soon as this all was over, Ghost promised themself as Hornet made a triumphant noise, having presumably spotted the passage, the very moment they were all three safe and secure, they were making a visit to Emilitia and learning her hand-language.

“Hold on,” Hornet said, and that was all the warning she gave as she let go of them entirely and they heard her claws click against her needle.

Ghost dug their own claws into her shawl and held on as tightly as they could as she leaned back and, with a soft exhale of effort, flung her needle. They heard it sing through the air, and then the silk she must have tied to the end pulled taught at exactly the moment she let go of the thread holding them up, and they started to fall.

Ghost battled down the urge to panic as they suddenly were pulled sideways through the blackness, reminding themself with increasing desperation that they definitely trusted Hornet with their life, and this definitely fell under that trust. Hornet, to Ghost’s exasperation, gave a soft, delighted cry akin to what she shouted in battle as Ghost felt them begin to succumb to the ceaseless pull of gravity and accelerate.

And then she was landing heavily on the ground and skidding to a stop. Ghost hardly dared twitch, all four limbs wrapped tightly around her torso, face buried securely in Hornet’s shawl.

“Alright, here we are. You’re safe now, little Ghost, you can let go.” Hornet said with amusement, her quiet laughter more vibration than sound against Ghost’s mask.

That was all well and good, Ghost thought irately, but they weren’t sure they could stand if they let go now. And it was still too dark to see, so they thought they wouldn’t take the chance. Ghost shook their head once in denial.

“I wasn’t going to let you fall, you know. You’re very light, I’m sure I could have grabbed you before you hit the ground.” Hornet told them as she started to walk anyway without waiting any longer, as though that was supposed to reassure them.

The thought of falling from that height through the black made Ghost’s void swoop like it was trying to recreate the experience. They shook their head violently and dug in their claws, trembling faintly.

“Ah, not so tight, or I’ll file those down.” Hornet winced. “Come on, get down. We’ll need to do a lot of climbing here soon.” She picked them up by the scruff of their cloak and they let go, crossing their arms moodily to conceal that they were very much afraid of what even they recognized was a useless thing to fear as she set them down beside her.

Hornet snorted good-naturedly at the sight. “You really wouldn’t have lasted a day in Deepnest among the spiders. The dark and the heights are as familiar to me as my needle. I’ll take you there one day soon and you’ll see what I mean.” She had an anticipatory gleam in her eye that Ghost did not appreciate, but she seemed thankfully happier now, and especially at the mention of her home, so Ghost gave a tentative nod in response.

They made their way down the tunnel, already dimly lit by its opening ahead, and soon stepped out onto the ledge of a great cliff. Ghost watched with amazement as something light and glowing, ever so faintly, a sickly off-white drifted past them, and across what they could see was a vast cavern they saw countless flakes of the stuff drifting in the sweeping wind, curling like eddies in a stream along the squalls. There wasn’t any other light source, but the persistent luminosity of a hundred thousand shreds of the stuff was enough to see by, and nearly too much to, overwhelming in an odd way that had little to do with the brilliance.

“That is the flaking molt of a dead wyrm.” Hornet said. “One would think it to have all rotted away by now, given how very long that particular wyrm-corpse has been languishing in this corner of the world, but if nothing else, its persistence is to be lauded.” She continued dryly. “Some call it snow, others ash, and I consider it a nuisance and very characteristic of the creature it originates from.”

Ghost picked up a handful of ash from where it had collected into a drift, blown in by the wind, and rubbed it between their fingers. The texture was somewhere between dried leaves and old paper, and it crumbled with a sound unlike either as it disintegrated to dust in their hands until they only had a double handful of yellowish-white powder.

“Gross.” Hornet commented over their shoulder where she had leaned down to watch. “You did hear that I just told you it’s the airborne remnants of a corpse?”

“That of the Pale King, then the Pale Wyrm, to be precise. Not that there are terribly many wyrms left, or were ever many to begin with. If there were, though, I suppose we’d be the last to know. I imagine any wise wyrm would avoid the corpse of their kin.” She told the wind, squinting out into the expanse.

Ghost noticed that the ash had left a residue on their hands, slightly oily and cloying, almost imperceptibly rancid like rot. As surreptitiously as they could, they wiped their hands off on Hornet’s shawl as she murmured to herself about the best path to take down. She shooed them with a hand but otherwise didn’t notice, still quietly debating to no one.

Finally, she tilted her head some and addressed Ghost, who looked anywhere but the little greasy handprints they’d left on her shawl. “There should be a narrow path across the-“ Hornet narrowed her eyes. “Why are you so suspicious? Ghost, what did you do?” She demanded.

Ghost gave an over-exaggerated shrug and folded their hands behind their back. Immediately Hornet’s eyes sharpened and she gave them a quick once-over, and then herself, and clearly found nothing obviously amiss because she only shot them a look that warned she’d be watching and dropped the subject.

“Hmph. Well, it can’t have been anything too bad. Anyway, we’re far too high up to see it, but there should be a depth of the cavern at which there are white roots growing from far side. Around there the walls narrow enough that a few of the thicker roots reach over to somewhere directly beneath us, and one or two of those is stable enough to support our weight. From that point it’s only a matter of choosing the right hole in the wall, so to speak.” Hornet explained.

“It is local myth that the Wyrm burrowed straight down from the surface at this spot,” She pointed up, and Ghost followed her claw where she indicated at the dark, fuzzy world above. “And formed this, the oldest excavated cavern in the Kingdom, with its dying writhing before he was reborn as the ruler and creator of Hallownest.”

Hornet paused, and scowled to herself. “I think that’s nonsense. Even at its greatest height, this cavern is perhaps twice again buried by the mountain range above. Hallownest was, regretfully, always a kingdom prone to such fanciful thinking, though.”

Ghost thought it made for a nice story at the very least, which was the important thing, and shrugged noncommittally as they peered down over the edge.

Hornet, for her part, took the time Ghost spent gawking at the height, the spiraling descent below that seemed to them like nothing so much as a sheer drop akin to the one overlooking Dirtmouth, to tie off a strand of silk to an aged fixture jutting from the wall and give it a few harsh tugs.

“This fall would be much further should you lose your footing, and we will need to land on a narrow ledge. Make sure you have a good grip and don’t throw me off balance, or I might miss.” Hornet told them and knelt down to let Ghost clamber onto her back.

They did so, awkwardly cinching their arms around her shoulders and avoiding the edge of her needle as best they could. Even by their best efforts it pressed threateningly against their stomach.

Hornet sighed in exasperation. “No, no, get down, this won’t work. You’ll cut yourself to pieces, and I need my arms free. This is no easy descent.” She considered for a moment.

“Here’s what we’ll do. I will jump down first and keep a hold of the thread, and you’ll follow after I land. Acceptable?”

Ghost did not particularly like that plan at all, listening to the wind claw at the stone outside, but they couldn’t think of one better, so they nodded.

“Good. Don’t descend until I yank the silk twice. Once we’re out in the wind, you won’t be able to hear me past it until you’re all but on top of me, and by then you should be safe anyway. Be careful.” Hornet warned sternly and stepped out into the sickly light.

Immediately, the driving wind that Ghost could see swirling the disturbed ash through the air swept at her shawl, and for a moment Hornet was a starkly cut, vibrant figure against the pale, and then she climbed down over the edge and was gone.

Ghost immediately began to worry, and just as quickly reminded themself that Hornet was either just as or even more capable than they when it came to general survivability, and probably more so in the kingdom she knew so well. Ghost had a wide scope of experience beyond the wastes; Hornet had mastered Hallownest for centuries.

To distract themself, Ghost looked out over Kingdom’s Edge and tried to discern the huge, rounded shapes like massive embedded carapaces they saw on the far wall, hazed by how thickly the wyrm-ash fell and distance and still discernible enough to identify.

Wouldn’t it be interesting if they _were_ carapaces, Ghost mused. Giant, ancient carapaces, set to stone by time and crushed close together by the compression of the heavy earth and the mountains above, cleaned and eroded around to make the great, endless walls of Kingdom’s Edge. Or maybe, Ghost thought with a flicker of amusement, brought to light by the tunneling of an ancient wyrm, on its way to found a marvelous, endless civilization.

If Ghost could have laughed dryly, they thought they’d have liked to, then.

But if they looked at it right, the way the snow fell reminded them very much of-

They pulled up short, confused. Of what? It reminded them of something, the way the pale flakes swirled in dry clouds, rising like dust motes; what was it? A land far away? A struggle long ago? A sight they’d fallen in love with?

Ghost realized they couldn’t remember.

And a fear they had first felt outside of Myla’s mine, when they’d noticed that the songs that they’d collected for years upon years had faded beyond recollection, those songs they’d held onto long after those who’d sung them were gone and Ghost was the only one to remember them any longer, started to creep into their soul.

Ghost’s hand crept similarly up to their chest as it tightened, and they reflexively pressed their claws to the chitin there. They had only to think it through, Ghost thought as something dull began to eat away at their senses. They could remember, of course they could, only it had been so long that anyone might begin to forget some of the things they’d experienced. It was like snow. Where had they seen snow before?

They could remember the icy wet bite of it on their hands, how the wind tossed their cloak about so it could sting them all over, distantly aching and nearly comfortable, comparable to the chill of their void.

Where, though? Which kingdom, which century, how many times? Ghost didn’t know.

They couldn’t remember.

Ghost curled in on themself and hid their face in their arms, as though the brightness and movement of the ash on the wind would carry away their focus, and tried over and over to chase down any name, any detail they could in what rationally they knew was a rich life of wandering and exploration, that now felt only like disjointed experiences, feelings, wonder without reason and pain without cause. Their void pulsed and swirled without rhythm in their carapace, hectic and disorienting.

And then there were hands gripping their shoulders, claws digging in just this side of painful and shaking them. Ghost remembered crushing bodies and heard long, dying screams and felt their panic spike and lashed out with their claws, mind too muddled to even reach for their nail. Their hand met only the thin resistance of fabric, and the tearing sound was so unexpected it acted as something of a reset.

Ghost looked up and the haze cleared enough to see Hornet crouched in front of them, her eyes alight with alarm, and a hand’s-worth of new little gashes clawed into the front of her shawl.

“Little Ghost,” She said quietly. “I’ve been calling your name. What happened?”

Their sister’s voice was carefully calm, and as they stared at her and struggled to reorient themself in a place and time that seemed wrong somehow she seemed to acknowledge that they were conscious of themself again and looked around, as though to find the problem hidden in a dark corner.

From her perspective, Ghost thought faintly, it might have been.

Their limbs felt stiff and heavy, but they uncurled as quickly as they could to instead burrow into her surprised arms. Hornet made a discomforted noise, but wrapped her arms tightly around them when they started to shake.

“Sometimes I forget how small you are,” Hornet mumbled with a sigh and rested her chin atop Ghost’s mask. “Hardly a weaverling. One day you’ll have to tell me what frightens you so, little wanderer.”

Ghost was too busy being deliriously relieved that she hadn’t pushed them away and focused on the sound of her voice and the warmth of her, curled protectively around them, because the clearest thing of all their years of surviving the wastes and strange lands far from Hallownest that they could recall was the constant, crushing loneliness.

It was the only thing whose absence they were deeply grateful for.

Ghost let the dense weave of Hornet’s shawl act in place of closing their eyes and tried very hard not to think of how vulnerable they felt. If they couldn’t remember anything but that they were forgetting, not a clear moment of years and years of life, what did that leave? Baseless impressions, intuition, the familiarity of a nail in their hand?

Whatever was left, it would have to be enough. Ghost let themself cry, overwhelmed by even the vague, formless shape of what they’d lost, but they were still them. Still the Knight, and now Ghost, and they still loved and fought and strove for what they might yet regain. Still shaped by their past and reaching for their future, though little of either was clear.

It was a very good thing, Ghost thought faintly, that they wouldn’t be leaving Hallownest again. Now, though they never would have to begin with (and they were certain of that, Ghost remembered with desperate clarity every moment from dropping their tooth-blade at Hallownest’s border to now), Ghost wouldn’t be _able_ to leave and risk losing this, too.

Ghost understood why Hornet had called this kingdom a tomb.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so the last shoe drops. 
> 
> Ironically, Ghost isn't actually afraid of a lot. For their siblings, of course, and of being totally alone again, but also, specifically, of heights in the dark.


	12. Graves and Those Who Watch Them

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The pair climb down through the Kingdom's Edge, a key is obtained, and a brief respite met.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Brief description of hopper murder.  
> There's little to warn about now, but I'll make it clear when the story comes to a point when there is.

They did make it down to the passage, in the end. It took a little longer than anticipated, and the driving wind of Kingdom’s Edge made rappelling down to it a dangerous task, particularly as Hornet seemed uninclined to let them out of her sight even once Ghost had shaken off the paralyzing fear of forgetting and they’d taken a short rest, during which Hornet had sewn up her shawl and given them a sound lecture upon discovering the pair of greasy stains they’d left on it.

Ghost was, at least, glad she wasn’t treating them too delicately, they thought as she scowled unforgivingly at them over her shoulder even as she shimmied carefully across the root-bridge she’d told them of earlier.

The rest had done them both good, however temporary, and they’d spent it poking fun at the Wyrm.

Or at least, Hornet had, entertaining them both by digging up all the wildest theories she could remember about Hallownest’s reclusive monarch, which Ghost supplemented with their best overexaggerated responses once they’d been taken off guard by enough of her irreverent retellings to push down their unease.

And Ghost had always been a resilient one, and determined to make the best of situations as they came, and so was now doubling down resolutely on making new memories, starting with mentally cataloging the curious way the sturdy, glowing white root kept trying to grow up around their hands, which conveniently meant they could ignore the irritated looks Hornet kept shooting them.

She’d been much more upset about the possibility of two permanent handprints left on the hem of her shawl than the four neat little gashes across the front, which was itself something Ghost was grateful she hadn’t mentioned.

This was helped along by that the root truly _was_ an interesting thing to consider. Ghost was sure they hadn’t seen a single tree (and what a relief, that basic knowledge wasn’t something the borders of Hallownest took, only the ‘how’s and ‘why’s that made it come about) since some time even before they’d fallen into the Kingdom. And it must be a massive tree indeed, they thought, to grow such an expansive root system. Not something one might easily overlook, especially if the tree itself glowed as brightly white as its roots.

A little ways in front of them, Hornet swung herself down and landed with a swirling puff of ash on the ground before the jagged, uneven opening that must have led deeper into the stone, one of hundreds that, to Ghost, looked exactly the same. Ghost scooted up to where she had jumped off from, aware of the yawning plummet beneath them if they missed, gave the root a last friendly pat (it seemed to glow a little brighter, though Ghost wasn’t sure what that meant) and dropped neatly down next to her.

Hornet scowled down at them. “The next time you place filthy hands on my clothes will be the last time you have hands.” She yelled decisively over the howling wind and strode away and into the cavern, clearly expecting Ghost to follow.

Ghost did follow, doing their best to project gleeful ignorance as they ran up alongside her.

“Don’t look so pleased with yourself, I’m threatening you.” Hornet told them, though her voice turned high in an unwilling giggle she only just contained at the end.

Ghost shrugged, glad for, if nothing else, that they were both in good spirits and delighted that they’d made their sister almost-laugh, and together they made their way deeper into the caverns.

Ghost kept expecting them to get darker as they progressed, and the wind to slow, stymied by the closeness of the walls and the quick turns and drops their path took, but it seemed Hallownest was eternally full of surprises. The gusting air only seemed to move faster the closer they got to their destination, and the off-white haze denser and harder to see through, and the glow of the roots and the ash alike brighter.

Hornet held her arm out to stop them suddenly and, as they watched, narrowed her eyes as though concentrating.

“A great hopper is ahead. The path narrows here; there will be no recourse but to slay it.” She announced.

Ghost didn’t think that sounded like such a bad thing. They hadn’t had the chance to use their nail properly since the ill-fated encounter within the Resting Grounds, and they were hungry. They drew their weapon to convey as much to Hornet, and briefly wondered if they’d still know how to use it.

“Do you want to take care of it?” Hornet laughed shortly and tilted her head to oblige them. “Be my guest, little Ghost. I’ve dealt with my fair share, and I’d like to see how you deal with such a beast.” She said as Ghost became aware of a heavy thumping in the distance, like something huge was leaping place to place and growing closer.

They bounced in place once to express to her that they were, in fact, eager to deal with it and rushed to meet the thing.

Ghost rounded a corner, almost too narrow to pass while wielding their nail, and immediately the thumping was louder. There before them and turning its long, pointed head in their direction, burning, infected eyes cutting through the ash-smog like candle flames, was a massive creature. It looked, conformation-wise, like the littler things Ghost had seen hopping distantly through the ash far below on the way down, but Ghost was sure none of those had anything resembling the mass of their larger kin.

It was big, and fast as it advanced on them, sharp legs digging forcefully into the ground with every landing and propelling it forward without hinderance. Ghost gripped their nail and tried not to be too excited.

And then the thing was on top of them and Ghost darted beneath it as it made to impale them on the blades of its legs. They had time to sweep their nail across the nearest set as it landed and see with surprise that the razor edge only scored a thin line in the thing’s unyielding chitin, and then it was in the air again and coming down hard.

Ghost jumped back just out of the way and struck again, to the same effect. Whatever its carapace was made of, it was sturdy enough to withstand the constant force of its favored hunting strategy without a splinter, and more than sufficient to protect from glancing blows of a little nail.

They would have to get clever, Ghost thought with excitement. They could see Hornet watching from the distant wall, eyes dispassionate, and they waved to her as they neatly ducked around a leg that came within inches of their mask. They saw her head move as though she were rolling her eyes at them, and with their audience in mind they threw themself into the combat.

Ghost danced around the thing as it became frustrated and moved with greater urgency, trying to leap where they would have been had they not moved a moment earlier, and Ghost noticed it’s searing orange belly, swollen with Infection and unarmored. When next the great hopper came crashing down, Ghost jumped up and over the thing and took a calculated swing at its pointed head. It reared back, flailing blade-sharp legs with force that would crack Ghost’s mask on impact, and they used the momentum to vault onto its sloping back.

There, they took hold of one tiny, frantically buzzing wing and slid down its side, yanking the thin appendage with all their might. The creature gave a piercing shriek and, already off balance, tried to lessen the strain by tilting to that direction and toppled to the ground, Ghost leaping free just in time and scrambling back up to stand on its twitching, struggling side.

However deadly the great hopper was on its feet, off of them it was all but defenseless, its legs angled all wrong to quickly get back up. And this was exactly what Ghost had been hoping for.

They braced their nail in both hands and plunged it into the joint of the front leg, and the hopper shrieked again, more shrilly, as Ghost severed it and then lashed their nail across the now-unprotected expanse of its bloated belly.

The great hopper burst like an overripe berry, flooding thick globs of its viscera down to the colorless ash and stone below. Its soul bled out similarly fast, thick and nourishing, and Ghost drank it down as they stood over the dying thing with orange staining their nail.

The creature gave a whistling wail and twitched once, violently, and fell still, the Infection already starting to fade from its corpse.

Ghost jumped down and made their way over to Hornet, flicking their blade clean.

Hornet considered the carnage, and then Ghost. “Nice,” She said, nodding appreciatively. “A clever, if foolhardy approach. I typically send my needle flying through its eye and end the battle in a moment, but your method is much more… Showy.”

Ghost, feeling significantly better now that they had plenty of soul to use, nodded once. They felt that if they had to try again it wouldn’t take nearly as long, but they still glowed privately with pride at Hornet’s approval.

She led them onward, past a claustrophobic passage that led almost directly up by means of spiraling, rough ledges, where Ghost could distantly hear the howling of the wind as it was temporarily slowed by the tight quarters, and then through a wider cavern, low but broad, the edges piled high with ash and those fossilized carapaces that made up the stone around, through which the wind drove uninterrupted and forceful.

It was nearly powerful enough to knock Ghost off their feet, and Hornet, walking in front of them with her eyes narrowed to black slits, didn’t seem to fare much better.

It occurred to Ghost that while the landscape of this particular cavern was wide and flat enough to facilitate a fair battle, it would be a truly terrible ordeal, with the unrelenting gale and the obscuring ash flying fast and choking. Ghost didn’t particularly think anyone else was down in this desolate corner of the Kingdom though, and for once that seemed like a good thing. They were then, in turn, glad Hornet was there alongside them to brave it, for all that this had been entirely her idea.

And then Hornet began to lead them down. Ghost had thought that the wind was originating somewhere through this passage, blowing harshly out into the incredibly wide, impossibly deep chasm they’d crossed to get here, and so they’d thought they would be eventually moving up and towards the surface. But now the wind was harsher and more tearing than ever, and still Hornet led them deeper. The way got brighter, though Ghost would describe the light as more haunting and lifeless than truly bright, and the wind got stronger, until it reached a crescendo and Hornet stopped abruptly.

“This is the Grave in Ash,” She called back to them, not a few feet behind her and doing their best to use her narrow frame to shelter from the wind. “And within it lies a choice. Will you press ahead in your journey, and accept the burden of its tragic conception? Will you know this Kingdom’s past, and your own?”

Ghost was nodding nearly before she had finished speaking. Yes, of course. Always. Anything. If it was for the Hollow Knight, anything.

Hornet planted her feet and raised her proud head, staring them down with all the pride she had left for her kingdom, and all the fierceness in her soul. “Then do it, Ghost of Hallownest! Head onward. Burn that mark upon your shell and claim yourself as King.”

Ghost felt the weight of her words, even though they did not know from where the gravity came, and stepped past her. The wind tore at their cloak and tried to fill their eyes, but they pressed on.

Before them loomed a great maw, pale and dark as porcelain and enshrouded by impossibly massive points, each as unforgiving and sharp as a nail’s edge and each casting a shadow even in this uncannily lit place. From within it came the wind, nearly as viciously sharp as the massive mandibles, and carrying on it the fast-darting flakes of molt. Ghost realized with a jolt that it looked familiar, that they had seen such a thing before. Long ago, when they’d picked up their tooth-blade, the one they’d abandoned near the gates of Hallownest.

How strange, that that memory was untouched.

It had been from a wyrm, same as this, and same as the Pale King. And here they were again, to claim whatever power lay in a wyrm’s ancient corpse. Ghost stepped inside the dry shell of the dead King where the wind blew fiercest and followed it, long and curving and immense. However grand the Wyrm might have been in life, in death it was only echoing and still, the squalling of the wind reverberating off the ribbed sides like an airless, endless cry.

And then they saw something gleam cold and bright in the recesses far before them. It grew brighter as Ghost grew closer, and they saw it was a single point of light, determined and unyielding, within a desiccated papery cocoon, long since broken out of and grown shriveled and colorless in the intervening years. Ghost stared at it and it resonated with something within them, not like the dreams and very differently from the first wyrm, but faintly so, like it had only the vaguest foothold in their being. They were surprised by how much they hated it.

But Ghost stretched out their hand regardless, and the light twitched like a thing in pain and darted to meet their palm. A blindingly white seal flashed for just a moment, only long enough for Ghost to have seen there was a seal in the first place, and then the frigid burn of the pale light seared into place on their hand. They closed it tightly, but the pain had already faded to a pulse.

And as they opened their hand to look at it, and saw the crowned symbol of the Pale King separate from Hallownest, the cavernous empty shell gave a resounding crack that echoed in Ghost’s mask. They looked up in time to see a chunk of the cadaver as old as the Kingdom break free from the thick shell above, easily large enough to crush them then and there.

Ghost stumbled backwards and just out of the way as it crashed down before them, crunching the paper-thin cocoon in an instant beneath its weight. Ghost took another step back, and then began to sprint away towards the mouth of the corpse, and Hornet. The wind was slowing, faltering, but it was still blowing the same way they ran as they fled, jumping with practiced grace around fallen and falling shell, using every ounce of their hard-won skill and reflex to make it safely out.

They nearly did. Ghost was in sight of the jutting maw, saw a glimpse of Hornet’s bright red shawl against the pale ash, and then as though in a final act of petty revenge the front section of the grave collapsed at once over them.

All was white. That choking, cloying ash had buried them alive, without even the courtesy of knocking them out first. Ghost struggled against it but it was packed tight around them, and they were pinned to something hard.

How much worse it might be, Ghost thought, if they’d had to breathe. Slowly, they began to squirm beneath the crushing weight, careful not to upset it as they worked to bring even one hand into a position to begin to claw their way free.

They heard something break overhead and froze. Then they heard Hornet and their void leapt with hope, even as they hadn’t dared allow themself to fear. Her voice was thickly muffled and far off, but she was calling for them. Ghost writhed in the pressing white ash, unable to care about the structural stability while she was searching so close for them, when she might accidentally miss them.

What worse could the Wyrm do, Ghost thought with an edge of disgust, it had already dropped a corpse on them.

They got an arm free and clawed at the ash in the direction of Hornet’s voice, scooping it away where it was too condensed and into pockets where it was looser, and then with a painful grating noise they wrenched their other arm free to do the same.

“Ghost!” They heard Hornet shout right above them, muffled but clearly at the top of her lungs, and before they could twitch they felt the displacement as she lunged into the thick layer of ash, and a hand brushed theirs and then gripped it securely.

Hornet hauled them out without any particular care for how whatever they were trapped against scraped and dug at their carapace and tore their cloak, but Ghost couldn’t find it in themself to be anything but blindingly glad. When she had them free Hornet stumbled back out of the soft upper layer of ash, that came up nearly to her waist and did come up to Ghost’s shoulders, and pulled them down with her when she tripped on the unsteady ground.

Immediately she rolled to her feet as Ghost lay prone, struggling between the hilarity of Hornet’s imperfect rescue, their overwhelming wonder that she would come back for them, even though they knew she always would, and the creeping realization that they had taken on something that was never theirs.

Ghost looked up at Hornet, who had fallen back into a tired crouch and was panting for breath, utterly covered in pale molt and the resulting oily stains, and hilarity won out. Ghost covered their eyes with their hands and felt their void jitter unfamiliarly.

“Ghost? What’s wrong?” Hornet asked, breathless and alarmed.

Ghost let themself laugh as best they could, completely soundless and probably disconcerting from the outside, which must have been what Hornet was worried about, and laughed harder at the thought. They shook their head and waved a tired hand at her before she could do anything drastic, or Wyrm forbid (and the saying caused them to break into another peal of twitching humor) try to shake them awake again.

Hornet seemed to realize there was nothing wrong, because when Ghost sat back up, she folded her legs beneath herself with a strained sigh. They sat in silence for a while, listening to the quieter wind and, at least in Ghost’s case, focusing to heal the cracked chitin and slowly bleeding scrapes they were covered with, to guide void to fill in all the new gaps.

Hornet looked at what was left of the wyrm-shell and hummed thoughtfully. “I suppose that could have gone more neatly. You have the mark, yes?”

Ghost nodded and held up their hand, where burned deeply into the carapace with the tines facing their wrist was the King’s Brand. It felt cold, Ghost noticed as they looked over it with her, but in a very different way than their void did. Void felt like nothing, like absence, but the brand felt like the coldest iron, cruel and uncaring.

At least it wasn’t their nail-hand, Ghost noted.

“Good. There is somewhere you must now face, to which only the King may open the way.” Hornet looked away, tracing the gentle fall of the ash on the breeze. “I’ve never been there. It is perhaps the only place in Hallownest I can truly say I have no experience of. And,” She hesitated, just noticeably. “I don’t think I can follow you there, if it is what I think it to be. Such places are not meant to sustain bugs such as I.”

Ghost leveled her with a surprised stare even as she wobbled to her feet. Just like that? They would have thought she’d want to rest first before embarking towards another destination, or at least stop for a nap. Ghost couldn’t say they were particularly good at keeping track of time this far below ground, but it had to have taken most of a day to traverse Kingdom’s Edge, and before then the journey from the City of Tears had been at least another.

Come to think of it, Ghost realized with alarm, they hadn’t seen Hornet sleep outside of quick stolen moments, a few minutes here or there, since they’d left the Royal Quarter. A few days without proper rest wasn’t much to Ghost, particularly since they’d had the chance to sit down every once in a while and heal the worst of the aches of travel, but they’d never known a bug to willingly go that long.

And now that they were looking, it was obvious. Hornet was exhausted. Her eyes were dull and she was breathing deeply and bracingly, though she should have been recovered from digging them out of the ash by now, like she was focusing on it. She hadn’t given the least consideration to her now-filthy shawl, coated in a fine layer of dusted ash that clumped messily around the neckguard and repaired holes. And perhaps most damning of all, the practiced grace, the ease of movement if not of composure that Ghost had come to inextricably associate with her, was all but gone.

To another bug less familiar with Hornet, she would have seemed perfectly within the ordinary as she shifted on her feet and glared without anger down at Ghost, falling back to what they were sure now was just her default expression, but when she was well Hornet stood nearly as still as they did, without a movement wasted.

Ghost stood up themself and shook their head meaningfully.

“No?” Hornet asked. “No, what? No to the Abyss? Ghost, if you don’t want to see what lies beyond the king-seal, I will not make you. I only-“

Ghost cut her off with another, hastier ‘no’. Of course they would go where Hornet thought they should. They trusted her understanding of Hallownest and its cruel past much more than their half-baked comprehension of the forces at play. If she thought it would help, they’d take it and be glad. Ghost reached out and carefully took one of her hands in theirs, which Hornet allowed with a perplexed scowl.

They led her unhurriedly to a thin crevice some ways away from the broken wyrm’s shell, a shallow scoop between two looming stone carapaces embedded in the wall and with some protection from the howling wind. There, Ghost tugged gently at her hand, concerned that she would realize what they were trying to do and bristle, and sat down against the stone. At their urging, and with narrowed eyes, Hornet tentatively allowed them to pull her down to sit across from them.

“Okay. I’m here. What do you want?” She asked bluntly.

Ghost decided not to hold it against her. Already she seemed antsy and restless, and ready to launch back into the fray. They could see she had favored her shoulder, the one she’d injured, while maneuvering out of the wind, and wondered with a twist of guilt if she’d opened the wound pulling them from the ash.

Now more than ever they wished they’d had time to learn even the basics of the hand-language before leaving the City of Tears, but there was nothing to be done for that.

Instead, Ghost pulled out a slightly crumpled sheet of paper and their dearly tattered pen and inkwell, and drew their best approximation of what they wanted, sheltering the ink from the wind with an arm as best they could and weighting down the paper with a loose fragment of desiccated chitin.

Hornet squinted at it as they drew, craning her neck to peer around them to get a better look.

“Is that… Me?” She ventured. “What am I… Am I just sitting there?” She asked, and sounded more concerned than Ghost thought was warranted.

Ghost tapped the top of the pen thoughtfully against their lower mask, and tried again.

“Oh, I’m under a blanket. Has anyone told you that you aren’t so bad at this? Drawing, I mean.”

Yes, they had, _she_ had what felt like years ago, but that was beside the point. Ghost tapped their drawing, and then pointed at her.

At last, understanding began to dawn in her eyes, immediately followed by resolute, ridiculous stubbornness. “We are in a hurry, Ghost. If you want me to rest, I can do so while you are beneath the Kingdom, in that cursed place.”

Ghost knew, and knew that she knew, that she wouldn’t do that. Not at the doorstep of somewhere that she had professed to being so uncertain of that she thought it might actively harm her to explore, in the open and unguarded. And Ghost also knew that they wouldn’t be happy to leave her undefended and alone while she slept, if the Abyss was anything like Kingdom’s Edge.

They weren’t in such a hurry that they wanted to watch Hornet wear herself into the ground. Ghost wasn’t even certain when she’d last eaten.

Ghost was profoundly moved that she would push herself so to help them meet their goal as quickly as possible, no matter that they were fairly sure (or at least, fervently hoped that) their goals were compatible, if not quite the same. But it gnawed at them, now that they were aware of it, to see that she’d run herself ragged for it.

Was it indicative of how dearly she wanted that final salvation for her kingdom, or of how little thought she gave to her own wellbeing? Ghost thought they didn’t like either. Ghost very much thought that they wouldn’t stand for either, not if it got Hornet hurt.

“Let’s go. We’re wasting time.” Hornet growled. She stood up much slower than usual, by only moments, and beneath her shawl Ghost was sure they saw her clutching her shoulder.

Ghost shook their head, crossed their arms, and stayed right where they were. If she wanted to be stubborn, fine. They would wear her down.

“What could you _possibly_ want, little Ghost?” Hornet exclaimed. “You’re fine, you’ve never complained before. I _told_ you I’d rest when we are at a place where it’s convenient. What else is there?”

“Hmph. What a foolish thing to ask.” A gruff voice said from just feet away.

Ghost jumped to their feet with their nail already drawn before they’d even looked to see what they were defending against.

Hornet, for her part, gave a grating screech such that they’d never heard her make, and hoped never to again. The sound was almost exactly the opposite of her usual smooth, calm voice, and sounded less like a battle cry and more like the panic of someone taken severely off guard, and when they looked back at her in shock for just a moment, to make sure she was alright, she seemed almost as surprised as they.

And their uninvited visitor, a big bug with unfriendly eyes and a colossal nail slung over his shoulder, looked somewhat taken aback.

“Weaverkin, hm? Haven’t seen the likes of you in a long time. Are you one of the spiders too?” He addressed Ghost, who shook their head before their senses caught up to them.

“All the stranger for it. What are you two doing down here, where the world ends?”

“What business is it of yours?” Hornet snapped, head lowered obdurately and gripping her needle so tightly Ghost could see her claws tremble with the effort. Ghost kept half their attention on her out of the corner of their eye.

“None, I suppose. I was under the impression that the solitude of this place was unshakable, though,” He tilted his head pointedly at the shattered wyrm-shell, lying in a bed of stone and ash. “And I was wrong. So tell me, what made you destroy what some might consider a priceless artifact?”

The flat way he asked implied that he was not among the ‘some,’ but the way he shifted his huge nail’s weight told Ghost he wanted an answer.

Hornet bristled defensively, and Ghost could tell she was about to say something she wouldn’t if she weren’t tired and angry, but the big bug stopped her, holding up his hand. He scrutinized her from beneath the headband he had tied just above his eyes, which might have given him a more judgmental appearance than he intended, and then sighed heavily.

“Come on then.” He said and turned and strode away, heavy footsteps leaving deep tracks in the ash.

When neither of them moved to follow, he stopped and gave them an irritated frown over his shoulder. “I’m offering you shelter. Hurry, or I’ll take my kindness back. You’ll tell me what you did once you’ve slept for a while.”

Ghost could hardly believe their luck. They ran after him without any more hesitation, listening carefully until they heard Hornet keeping pace behind them, heart a little lighter to hear her follow, though when they looked back, they could see she was anything but pleased about it.

Oh, well. She’d thank them when she felt a little better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of sibling fluff before rubber hits the road again. I guess it already has, in a way. No turning back now! 
> 
> One of our top three favorite nailmasters has made an appearance at last! And a good thing, Ghost isn't the sort to give in easily, but neither is Hornet unless the odds are /really/ stacked against her. Birds of a feather.


	13. Of Different Minds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hornet meets a kindred spirit, who only doesn't want her to make his same mistakes.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Past poor self-care, brief, slightly gross/gory description of unorthodox field dressing, Hornet is Hangry and Prickly, Oro is Bitter and Prickly and maybe just as tactless as Hornet, Ghost is concerned and deserves none of this.

It wasn’t such a long walk to the bug’s hut. Ghost was buzzing with questions, maddeningly curious about the strange bug Hornet was so aggressive towards, which seemed out of character even now. But to their dissatisfaction he didn’t so much as glance at them as he led them through narrow passage after passage, sometimes so steep they were forced to scramble up loose rocks or risk slipping back down, though the big bug always seemed to know where to put his weight, and sometimes so choked with ash that he plowed through ever-growing piles of it, higher than his waist, with a resigned grumble.

Then he climbed with a grunt up a final ledge and strode quickly away without a word while Ghost and Hornet did the same, where for much of the road back he’d kept his pace more or less to what Ghost’s short legs could keep up with without running. Ghost looked up in time to see the edge of his dusty, ash-stained cloak catch a final parting gust of the harsh wind before he entirely disappeared into a large hut, set deeply into the stone and accumulating ash but heavyset and imposing all the same, the walls crafted of something that even now gleamed darkly like polished chitin, ringed with tall spikes like fangs that were too uniform to be anything but carved by a bug’s hand.

It was an unwelcoming effect, and as Ghost caught sight of a weathered training dummy topped with the head of a decapitated great hopper, hanging listlessly from an iron pole, they thought it rather fit its owner.

“Hmph. I expected as much.” Hornet spoke up, eyes narrowed with distaste at the sight. She caught Ghost’s questioning glance and scoffed. “Nailmasters are fools, and always have been. So set on their isolation and their personal attainment, expertise or otherwise, they couldn’t be bothered to lend themselves to the Kingdom when it called them. Except, I suppose, when the reward was geo, taking from this one’s distant home.” Hornet said scathingly.

Ghost half-expected a violent response for her uncharitable summation, but the entrance to the Nailmaster’s hut remained shadowed and reclusive, unshaken by the wind like it was only another part of the cliffs. They watched it for a few seconds, then held out their hand to Hornet. They were sure she wouldn’t be going inside without encouragement, and Ghost wasn’t leaving until she’d rested somewhere out of the chilling wind.

“I don’t need to hold your hand, Ghost, I can find my own way in well enough.” She snarled like a creature wounded, and Ghost heard real, furious offense in her voice and snatched their hand back.

Hornet brushed past them and strode inside, and Ghost couldn’t do anything but follow her, hurt.

If Hornet was irritated by the exterior of the hut, the interior must have been infuriating. It was decorated much the same as the Nobles’ homes and halls back in the City of Tears, though much better kept in spite of the howling wind outside, oddly muffled so that the silence was pressing and intense here within the Nailmaster’s sturdy walls.

There was nothing in the way of real furniture, but the smooth walls were lined with short, delicate shelves, each densely populated with little trinkets and finely carved writing-stones, and the walls draped with heavy curtains, though Ghost hadn’t seen any windows from the outside. The curtains were of the same thick, richly colored fabric that kept out the sound of the rain so well in the City, so Ghost imagined they were serving a similar job here.

“Better you hate Nailmasters than covet their skill, spider. I am Nailmaster Oro. Sleep, tell me what you did, and then leave.” Oro said lowly, his calm, deep voice unhurried but resentful. He was sitting in the middle of the floor, in a patch of thin light edging in through the roof and spilling over the ruff of his long cloak.

Hornet was as carefully still as if she were sizing up an enemy she wasn’t sure she could face. They stared at each other across the room, Oro level and unfazed and Hornet with cold distaste.

Then she broke the contest to look to Ghost, standing uncertainly to the side, and they saw her take a deep, intentional breath and forcefully let it go.

“Fine. Wake me in an hour.” She instructed Ghost and then neatly drew her needle, laying it over her lap as she sank to the floor and rested her back against the wall.

Ghost sat down next to her, careful to leave her space, and turned their attention to Oro, who huffed in what might have been satisfaction if he weren’t so obvious dissatisfied with the situation, and gestured to Ghost with an impatient, beckoning wave.

Ghost glanced at Hornet, but she was somehow already out cold as though she’d been asleep as soon as her back had hit the wall, though they’d been sure and thought she’d been equally sure that she would be too tense to do anything but feign sleep. Yet her claws were loose around her needle and her head lolled boneless against her chest, shoulders rising and falling gently as she breathed.

“One can hold as much a grudge as they want, but when they get as tired as her they’ll sleep the moment you sit them down somewhere half-comfortable.” Oro’s voice was rough as ground stones, but quiet. Hornet didn’t even twitch.

“How long has she been awake? Three days? Four?” Oro asked them as Ghost got up and left her to sleep, though they stood pointedly between the Nailmaster and their sister.

Ghost wasn’t sure, and the uncertainty ate at them. They shook their head to answer.

“Hm. Let her sleep as long as she will, and make her eat when she wakes up.” Oro grunted as he pushed himself to his feet, resettling his cloak about himself and looking down at Ghost with dark, uninterested eyes. “I’ve taken care of enough overzealous idiots in my time to know one when I see them. Though I’d expect better from this one at first sight; she seems the practical sort.” He shrugged heavily and strode out the door, brushing close enough by Hornet for Ghost to tense and reach for their nail, but Oro only left without another word.

Ghost stared at the empty door, the wind sweeping away any noise of Oro’s retreating footsteps, and then, slightly despairing, at their sleeping sister, who gave no indication that she noticed them at all and only snored peacefully on.

And Ghost was alone in a stranger’s home, again.

A stranger’s fairly interesting home, as it happened. Ghost, not especially tired and, even if they were, unwilling to let their guard down while their sister was depending on them to keep her safe, turned their attention instead to Oro’s house.

Whatever Hornet’s opinion about him, Ghost couldn’t deny that the Nailmaster was kind. However much he wanted to know what had finally destroyed the old wyrm-shell, and Ghost was beginning to suspect that wasn’t very much at all, Oro hadn’t needed to bring them back to his own home and out of the wind. Ghost wasn’t spectacularly well-versed in social niceties, but they didn’t think letting a stranger sleep alone in one’s home was an obligation many felt.

How curious, that in such a ravaged and destroyed corpse of a land as Hallownest there would be so many bugs who would go out of their way to show kindness to another. It was almost as though in defiance of their circumstances, as though in surviving this long and losing everything to plague or to the quiet dissolution of the Kingdom, those isolated and coarse bugs that still lived clung ever tighter to what they had left, and what they had left was faith in each other.

Even Oro, who to all appearance kept himself intentionally sequestered where unlikely visitors were all but impossible, in spite of his brusque way of showing it had seen Hornet in a bad way and allowed them refuge without a second thought.

And, well, Ghost couldn’t bring themself to think badly of him only on Hornet’s word, because of some vague misdeed he committed so long ago. Especially considering Hornet’s own past. And Oro was kind to them, and more importantly, kind to her, so Ghost decided they would like him well enough to make up for Hornet’s distaste.

That’s not to say, however, that they weren’t going to poke around some in the meantime while Oro was off doing whatever it was he did.

Ghost gave Hornet a last searching look to make sure she was asleep and padded over as soundlessly as they could to investigate the racks and racks of little shiny things that had caught their eye the moment they’d walked in as, in her corner, their sister began to quietly snore.

They’d just picked up a particularly pretty piece of art glass that caught their eye, colored with rich emerald and dripping cherry red and carefully wound in the shape of a knot of thorns, each of countless little red prickles so thin and precise that the only safe place to pick it up without risking snapping one off was a convenient little curl of smooth green stem at the top, and balanced it in their hands when they heard heavy footsteps at the door.

That was fast, Ghost thought with surprise as Oro stepped inside. He was carrying a heavy sack over one shoulder, beginning to bleed through with muddy orange, and in the other arm he cradled a small cluster of squishy-looking blue things, pressed just tightly enough to his side that the thin little legs affixed to each couldn’t pull the whole set free.

Attention caught, Ghost went to put the fragile piece of glass back.

“Keep it. I’ve got too many gifts and little ‘thank-you’s to keep track of. Can’t even remember where that one came from.” Oro told them as he hefted the sack and tossed it heavily to the floor, where it landed with a wet noise on the dusty floor. Then he crossed the room to where Ghost had instead returned the knickknack to its original home.

“Keep ahold of these.” He said gruffly and dumped the squirming blue creatures for Ghost to hold.

Ghost startled at the feeling as they fell into their arms, soft and giving and almost insubstantial, like if they dug a claw even just a little into the gel-like membrane they’d burst like a berry. Ghost scrambled to keep the whole set in their arms without crushing any and cast Oro a bewildered look.

“Never seen a lifeseed? Many haven’t. Used to be fairly sought after. They’re around just about everywhere nowadays, if you know were to look. We’ll give one or two to your friend and she’ll perk up some.” Oro explained, sounding more resigned than anything else. “It’ll get her out of here quicker.”

He opened the leaking sack and hauled out a dead hopper, neatly decapitated, and waved an expectant hand at Ghost. “Hand me a lifeseed. I don’t have the patience to prepare these right.”

Ghost, too interested both in what the odd little things did and what Oro planned to do with them to be properly baffled, performed some quick repositioning to prevent any lifeseeds from wandering off while they singled one out of the squirming pile and handed it over.

Oro took it carefully in hand and, without warning, shoved it into the leaking, headless hopper carcass’ open wound. Ghost heard it burst wetly amidst the squelch of the hopper’s still-glowing viscera, and then the orange began to be overtaken by drips of blue. The colors didn’t mix, behaving instead like the carcass was oozing oil and water, separate drips of softly glowing blue and bright searing orange flowing quickly, and then the blue overwhelmed what dimming orange was left. The whole creature looked more alive for a breath, chitin gleaming and healthy, limbs laying at a more natural angle for just a moment, and then the lifeseed’s influence faded and it was just a headless corpse again.

But, Ghost noticed with fascination, without any trace of Infection. The organs that were visible where the head should have been were the dull, dark blue of fresh hemolymph.

“A trick I picked up. Good in a pinch. The meat will taste weird, but won’t kill you.” Oro tossed the hopper to the side and picked up the next, and Ghost handed him another lifeseed. “Obviously doesn’t work when they’re still alive. The Infection has to be weakened first, and the 'seed's gotta go in glowing.” Oro instructed.

They’d be sure to remember that, Ghost thought, watching carefully as Oro repeated the process with the second hopper, if ever they happened across more lifeseeds.

Oro cleaned out three hoppers and set them aside, and then sat himself down in the middle of the floor and did nothing at all for several minutes, breathing slowly and deliberately.

When he looked up, Ghost was standing directly in front of him. They tilted their head questioningly.

“I’m meditating. Go entertain yourself elsewhere.” Oro groused.

Instead, Ghost sat down and mirrored the way Oro had folded his legs in front of him.

“Hmph. So now you’d like to learn something. Are you worthy of my teachings, you disruptive little grub?”

Ghost thought that was uncalled for, but nodded regardless.

Oro, to their surprise, laughed hoarsely under his breath. “Well, I can’t complain that you’re too loud for me. And it is the law of the Great Nailsage that I must pass down what I’ve learned.” Oro recited with mild antipathy.

“How about it, then? Pay me for my time and allow me to abide by my laws.” Oro peered at them. “Or maybe you aren’t after my nail art. I can tell a master when I see one.”

“No, perhaps you’d rather something to help you deal with your own bullheaded irritant, hm? Do you know how to meditate?” Oro asked.

Ghost shook their head attentively.

“Ah, I suppose I won’t charge for something so basic. Sit down, and I’ll teach you how to breathe right.”

That turned out to be a lesson in futility as Oro discovered that Ghost did not breathe, but the rest of his instruction translated better. Truth be told, Ghost appreciated the opportunity to be still for a little while. They wouldn’t trade their sister for the world, but she wasn’t the sort to stop and smell the flowers, so to speak.

Not that they were on the sort of time schedule that allowed it anyway.

And meditation turned out to be fairly similar to what they did to calm themself down after a panic, only more structured and relaxed, and without such a defined goal. It was a nice thing to sit down and master, with no consequence for failure other than Oro sharply admonishing them for fidgeting, and a good way to pass the hours until Hornet woke up.

And it did take hours. She’d never slept so long before, as long as Ghost had known her, and the quiet started to become concerning when five hours had passed and she still hadn’t awoken.

Oro sighed heavily after the third searching glance they made at her. “Many bugs sleep as long as eight or nine hours a night, don’t be so rushed. I wish I wasn’t intimately familiar with the sort who don’t, and yet. Neither of my brothers are one to appreciate a good night’s sleep. Their loss, if you ask me. Mato in particular, always getting up early to train and never asleep when he ought to be.” Oro snorted fondly.

Then he sobered and glared darkly at nothing. “Suppose I won’t have to deal with him again.”

Ghost looked at the Nailmaster inquiringly, curiosity piqued. Brothers? If Oro had brothers, where were they? Ghost couldn’t imagine looking so resentful, thinking of their siblings.

“Hm. If you ever come across my brother, and he mentions me, tell him to be patient. It will be a while longer before I give him what he wants.” Oro told them grimly.

Ghost nodded sagely, and tried to remember to remember to learn to write the phrase out for that.

There was a quiet groan from the other side of the room, and Ghost noticed that Hornet’s snoring had stopped at some point. As they glanced over their shoulder, sat cross-legged beside Oro, she gripped the needle that had never left her hand and arched her back, raising her arms over her head and spurring her joints to snap alarmingly. Then she sighed heavily and opened her eyes.

Ghost waved at her, needlessly relieved to see her awake. Hornet gave a short, sleepy giggle and waved back. Then her eyes fell on Oro and she was on her feet and across the room in a moment with her needle at his throat.

“What did you do to me?” She hissed, eyes bright and focused.

Ghost looked between the two, glaring at each other with intensity, and decided to sit this one out.

“Nothing. You crashed, idiot.” Oro ground out an unfriendly laugh. “Your little friend couldn’t say, so tell me; how long were you pushing yourself that you were out cold for half a day in a stranger’s home?”

“Not long enough to do _that_.” Hornet defended, conspicuously angling her needle so it caught the light.

“Yeah? So you were alright leaving the little one defenseless because _you_ couldn’t handle what you thought you could?” Oro accused, voice biting and bitter. Hornet lowered her weapon and took a startled step back, rigid as frozen iron, eyes shocked-wide. “You’re an over-confident fool. I could tell from the moment I heard you speak, you’re ready to take everything on yourself, because who else is there, hm? Tell me I’m wrong.”

Hornet’s face closed off and she glared out of narrowed eyes. Ghost watched, dumbfounded, as she stood there and said nothing in her defense, claws tight on her needle at her side.

Oro steamrolled on. “One day you’ll push too hard, demand too much of yourself or others, and someone else will suffer for it. Realize now that it was never just you.” There was bitter regret in Oro’s voice as he told her this, voice low and intense.

“It was _always_ just me!” Hornet burst out. “Do you think I _wanted_ to be the only one to step up when the Kingdom was in need? The King was gone, those who might organize in his place asleep, the tribes isolating themselves. All those who knew my _name_ have been dead or gone for an age. If I pushed too hard, if I asked too much, if I did not rest and did not stop, it was only to do what was necessary.”

She laughed quietly and without humor. “It’s not like it killed me. What’s a week, what’s a month, when there is so much on the line?” She said without a trace of sarcasm, and Ghost’s void ran cold.

Even Oro seemed taken aback, sitting quietly as he regarded her. “You’re no use dead. And you have someone who cares deeply who you have to consider, if you won't consider yourself.” He said finally.

Ghost could take no more, guilt burning deeply and cloying-hot in the base of their throat. They stood up and cautiously, watchfully went to wrap their arms tightly around Hornet’s waist, burying their face in her shawl when she did nothing to drive them off. Hornet flinched once, violently, though she’d watched them walk closer with observant eyes and made no move to avoid them.

It was like she hadn’t truly expected them to touch her, though she’d seen them deliberately move to with her own eyes. The thought hurt, somehow.

“So I do,” Hornet mumbled, equal parts disbelief and wonder.

Ghost wished that they could reassure her. That they could tell her they would not want any progress at the cost of her, that they could no more watch Hornet put herself through hell than they could leave the Hollow Knight within their prison.

If Hornet was so set on placing the fate of Hallownest squarely on her own shoulders, in practice if not in word, Ghost would take it up as well.

And they’d make sure she slept.

Hornet placed a careful hand on their mask, warmer than the surrounding air and comforting, and they squeezed her tighter for a moment, then let go, just in case she still wanted her space.

Oro cleared his throat thickly, and Ghost looked up to see him turning away towards the fire he’d set up at a break in their meditation, where the cleaned-out hoppers had been slowly cooking over a low, sweet-smelling flame, burning just high enough to singe the beasts’ dark chitin.

“These should be done. Eat something, then get out.” Oro grumbled at them.

Hornet perked up immediately, as though just taking notice of the food. She eyed her hopper, with all its exoskeleton nearly of a weight with her, as Oro expertly wrapped the gently-steaming things in thick cloth and handed one to each of them.

Ghost accepted theirs with a stagger and sat down as Oro did, relaxing with the weight and heat radiating into their front where they held it snugly. Hornet sat down next to them with considerably more grace, her legs disappearing beneath the billow of her shawl, and considered the food with suspicion even as Oro wasted no time wedging his claws into a joint in the shell and wrenching it open with an echoing crack.

“Where did you find uninfected creatures?” Hornet asked.

“I didn’t. I used lifeseeds to flood out the illness, and baked away the rest.” Oro replied, mouth already full of meat, and snapped off a leg to gnaw at.

Hornet recoiled in disgust. “And that worked?”

“Eat it or don’t.” Oro replied, neatly shoveling more into his mouth.

Hornet hummed mistrustfully, but as she watched Oro make quick work of his own hopper, hunger apparently won out. She dragged a sharp claw down the thing’s belly and opened it, taking a moment to look carefully over the exposed viscera, and then snapped off all the legs and set them aside, and lifted the rest to her mouth to take a huge bite.

Ghost watched with amusement and relief as her eyes widened and she didn’t even pretend to be unimpressed, choking down her mouthful and tearing off another.

“What did you do to it?” Hornet demanded almost unintelligibly. “It’s good.”

“Fungal wood. Some types of stalks grow hard, burn low and hot enough to be useable inside. Covers the flavor of the lifeseeds. I’ve been cooking with it long enough that most of the shine’s off the aroma, but it’s not so bad.” Oro explained. “The only danger is sometimes one picks up the wrong species, and one’s hut smells terrible for days.”

Ghost thought that sounded rather like something Cornifer had said to them once, confessing with a self-conscious laugh the mushrooms he’d brought back to Dirtmouth to try with Iselda, and the unfortunate, malodorous consequences.

Hornet snorted at whatever thought had occurred to her at Oro’s admission, face buried in her hopper, and Oro cut her a short glare.

“You must show me what sort it comes from, one day.” Hornet said lightly through her mouthful.

“Hmph. Don’t get yourself killed in the meantime and I just might.”

They sat in silence for a few more minutes as Hornet and Oro ate, and Ghost sat in sleepy contentment and watched them absently.

“Aren’t you going to ask what we’ve done? Disturbing you in your solitude, and all?” Hornet said suddenly.

“Hmph,” Oro huffed again and glanced aside. “I don’t see how it’s my business. Just don’t take advantage of my hospitality.” He warned.

Hornet gave a sharp laugh, face smeared with gore. “I don’t think we could have escaped it.”

“All the more reason to get out while you can, if that’s how you see it.” Oro shot back, and Ghost realized with delight that they were being _friendly_.

They weren’t sure what silent agreement the two had come to, but whatever understanding they reached, Hornet seemed to relax some in it, which was a welcome change.

When Hornet had finished and informed Oro that, among other things, Ghost did not eat either, they helped Oro clean up and prepared to leave.

“Wait,” Oro stopped them as Hornet took a step out the door. “Take a few of these with you so I don’t come across your corpses littering the Edge.” And he offered her the remaining lifeseeds, only two, held securely in his big hand. “In fact, use one now for that shoulder.”

Hornet shifted so the joint in question was further from him and considered him with suspicion. “How did you know about that?”

Oro scoffed and jostled the lifeseeds, which had lost some of their luster by now but still kicked feebly. “I spent a long time around people who tried to hide wounds nigh daily. Just don’t let the ash in and open a lifeseed on it once or twice. It won’t heal it, but it’ll keep out infection.”

“Yes, I know what lifeseeds do.” Hornet snapped, but accepted them anyway and passed them wordlessly to Ghost to hold.

They tucked them away as Hornet and Oro sniped at each other for a little longer, then Hornet stormed out in a huff. Ghost waved to Oro and, after a moment’s consideration, bowed respectfully.

Oro blinked in surprise. “Save it for when you’ve got the geo to learn anything important,” He said, but bowed back anyway as Ghost left to catch up to Hornet.

Just a few steps away Hornet was peering at their surroundings, and when they came to stand beside her she looked away.

They stood in silence for a few minutes, listening to the wind blow around them. Ghost waited for her to say something, but while her shoulders were rigid and her hands clenched at her sides, the relative quiet dragged on.

Then Hornet made a frustrated noise, and turned back to them. “I’m sorry, Ghost. I was unkind to you.” She forced out, the words stilted in her mouth but genuine nonetheless.

Ghost tilted their head in surprise, but she had more to say.

“As loathe as I am to say it, the Nailmaster is right. I have responsibility to Hallownest, but to you as well. I should not have taken that frustration out on you, over something even I cannot change.” She narrowed her eyes, looking back out at the ash and stone. “I suppose I should… Rest. Sometimes.” Hornet said with disgust, like the concept of having to deal with such a weakness was repulsive.

Ghost held out their hand again, something sad and resigned pulling at their void. Yes, Ghost would make sure she rested, and when their job was done, they’d make sure she didn’t find something else to put above her own wellbeing. That would have to be enough for now.

Hornet eyed their open hand, palm up and patient, and relented to squeeze it bracingly in her own, once, before letting them go.

“At any rate, I think I know where we are.” Hornet said loudly, turning away. “Just a ways back from the rift, somewhere beneath the Grave. We’ll take the tram, I think, since I’ve still got my pass. Have you ever been on a tram?” Hornet asked as she struck off in a seemingly random direction, leaving Ghost to follow.

They shook their head and looked up at her curiously. They might have at some point, but they had no idea if it was a common experience or not.

“I don’t blame you. When Hallownest had time to build such things as tramways, only the few could actually ride them. It was something of an experience to those who got the chance. The longest line is down where few went without cause, and the only other tramline in operation was mainly used to access the Resting Grounds more quickly from the Crossroads, where a majority of the common populace of Hallownest once lived.”

She gave a considering hum as they climbed down a toppled pile of cracked stone, edges buffered in ash. “Of course, the Pale King did try for one to Deepnest at some point. Supposedly, it was to open trade. Herrah the Beast took exception, and if she did not want something in Deepnest, it would not be. I was told she was one of very few to deny the Pale King’s wishes like that.” Hornet said with something like carefully distant pride.

“At any rate, the trams of Hallownest, like most everything else still remaining, were built to last. They will carry us to the Ancient Basin, the once-stronghold of the Pale King and the site of his destroyed palace, and within the Basin is a place you must enter.”

Ghost thought that was fair, listening intently. Everything they heard about old Hallownest made them wonder more about it, about how it worked and who lived there and what they were like and what they did. Hallownest’s people had lived between and created wonders, but more than that, it felt odd to be of Hallownest, to be immersed in what all was left of its people, and know so little about it. Every detail Hornet told them, directly or not, filled in the picture a little more, and made Ghost lonely for people they’d never met.

Yet they soaked it all in and hungered for more. Maybe it was their history and responsibility to the place, but Ghost was sure they wanted to _know_ about Hallownest more than any other kingdom they’d come to, and though they regretted not coming back sooner for many reasons, having missed the last real culture and living information it could have offered was certainly among them.

Ghost watched the ash drift quietly for a time, trundling alongside Hornet through the drifts, and then remembered with delight the tablets they’d pocketed before their surprise meeting with Emilitia. They tugged excitedly at Hornet’s shawl, which she squawked a protest at as they dug their claws lightly into the crimson weave, and reached inside themself to pluck out the first tablet they laid their hand on. This they offered up to her, waving it until Hornet obliged them

She turned it over in her hand, scanned through what it said, and then glanced back down at Ghost. “What should I do with this?” She asked blankly.

Ghost nabbed another little tablet scrawled with writing and mimed looking closely at it as though reading, then raised a hand to where their mouth would be and opened it outward, trying to imply speech.

“Hm. You want me to read it to you?” Hornet asked dubiously.

Ghost nodded fervently.

“Where did you even get this? This is a,” She peered at it closer. “’A Proposed List of Computational Algorithms’? Little Ghost, I haven’t dealt with,” Hornet waved a searching hand as she grasped for a term. “Math. In a very long time.”

Ghost would have liked to hear what was on it anyway even if they hadn’t a snowball’s chance in Greenpath at understanding it, but Hornet seemed less keen, so they held out a hand for it back and replaced it with the next.

Hornet looked over this one with more interest. “Histology. I believe I remember what the field is, at least. The scholars of the Archives were always on about their findings on the subject, as concerning the Infection. It is the study of… Flesh? No, that’s not quite right. The study of what the flesh of a creature is when examined very closely.”

Ghost listened with excitement as she began to read off what the tablet had scrawled on it, from the date in the corner (which meant very little to Ghost, who didn’t even know the current date) to the names at the end (no one Hornet recognized, and no one famous enough to be familiar regardless).

Once she’d finished with the one, a short report made up mostly of words Ghost had never heard and half of terms Hornet had to sound out glyph by glyph, they handed her another. Hornet didn’t complain, and even began to debate a few of the finer points of the next tablet after that, which concerned knitting textiles and their specific pros and cons.

“Nothing is better than Weavers’ silk,” Hornet objected when the writing suggested otherwise. “It’s strong, pliable, soft, and from a skilled Weaver can be of any weight one could ever want. And that’s only for the strictly textile uses. It’s absolutely ridiculous to think that,” She scanned for the offending sentence. “That _shellwood fiber_ is good for anything but the roughest overcloaks.”

“And remind me to make you an overcloak one day,” Hornet told them distractedly. “I will make it in any color you could possibly imagine, as soft as moths’ down and as durable as pale ore. Your cloak isn’t suitable to cooler weather.”

Ghost, hanging on her every word and trying to imagine the pride the spiders must have had, to have impressed it so firmly upon her, nodded even though they thought that there wasn’t anything cold enough in Hallownest to shake them.

Hornet launched into an explanation of the simplified process of silk-spinning then without being asked, to Ghost’s gratification, which as they descended carefully through Kingdom’s Edge turned into a brief history of knitting and then Hornet’s own slightly briefer history with the skill, which exacted a promise to weave Ghost a new set of clothes and then another to teach Ghost how to weave their own clothes. At some point after that Ghost handed her a new tablet and the process essentially repeated, though this time concerning everything Hornet knew about chemistry, which turned out to be more than Ghost would have expected.

It was a pleasant way to pass the time, listening to Hornet talk and adding everything she knew to their own mental map of Hallownest’s past. Ghost could already tell that among all the memories they were sure they’d make, that they’d have to make and maybe, depending on exactly what was lost, remake, this would be one of their favorites. Hearing Hornet laugh to herself about something funny she’d remembered, moving forward with a clear goal in mind, rested and fed and, in spite of it all, happy.

Hopeful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hornet actually got a fairly decent education, I think, which was forced upon her in every inch, from the Weavers of Deepnest who took part in raising her. She's something of a prep-passing jock. Any academic knowledge she has to her name is entirely against her will, but a princess ought to know /some/ things. Cookies if you can guess who the art glass is from, by the way. Oro remembers exactly who, he's just brusque and resentful.
> 
> Also, I write a lot more STEM-related writing than fanfic. So if anything seems overly technical, that's probably why. That's part of why this darn fic is so long; I'm a sucker for detail when I should just let it lie.


	14. False Security

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A name is a wonderful gift, even if given not entirely selflessly.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : One (1) Fool from the Colosseum meets an unfortunate end, Hornet has a Lot to say.

Soon they’d descended far below where they’d traveled before, and the ash was piling up less and less, and by its absence the way had become darker and more heavily shadowed. Drifting through the ash and pushed about by the less forceful winds were big, round bugs beating sets of tiny wings to stay aloft. The darkness rose around them, and Ghost began to hear the hiss and steady trickle of acid.

“Keep aware, Ghost. Take care not to fall-“ Hornet said, and was cut off by something falling without warning from above.

It landed with a metallic, wet crunch, and Ghost recognized it immediately as dead even before they could make out, through the gloom, that it was a bug. They were wearing armor, thick and broken and dully bronze in the faded light, and as Ghost watched the corpse began to leak orange from beneath it, spilling across the path and dripping down to the acid below. It had appeared so fast, if Ghost could have blinked they might have missed it as it dashed itself against the stone, the way empty one moment and barred the next.

Hornet recovered first as Ghost stared, more confused than concerned. “I’d have thought us too deep to be bothered by the Colosseum, but this one must have beaten the odds. This is a Fool, of the Colosseum of Fools, who fight far above.” Hornet explained and kicked the body from the road with disdain.

Ghost heard it crash into something else, then a loud, if distant splash.

“Bloodsport and rightly-named contestants. All infected now, of course. They hoped too fervently to have been spared, those desperate fools who sought to stake their bloodied nails among the victors.” Hornet mused. “But it’s not a new institution. Only, once it was not often to the death. I competed at one point.”

Ghost shot her an interested glance, which she waved off irately. “I was young and stupid, and I won, regardless. But I’d seen enough to know not to go back. _You_ should have seen enough, just from this, to know not to go at all. There is no mercy within the Colosseum, and that fool is only the tip of the iceberg.”

Hornet hopped down a last ledge and crossed a bridge, alarmingly worn where it arched over streams of acid, the sides pockmarked where over time it had eaten away even the solid stone bricks that made up the foundation, and then ducked into a tunnel beginning to regrow stalagmites and away from the restless wind.

There she reached into the little bag she kept under her shawl and withdrew what Ghost recognized as a small glass ball taken from a light in the City of Tears, containing an even smaller and slightly dim lumafly. She handed it to them and Ghost held it up to their face, tapping gently at the surface until the lumafly brightened some and fluttered its wings.

“It’ll only get darker from here, but we shouldn’t have much need to fight for a while. I will be able to see unimpeded for some time yet, but I imagine you might appreciate a little more light.” Hornet told them as she led the way into the dark.

Ghost found that she was right, as they passed through winding, narrow caverns leading inexorably down. For some stretches the little lumafly was the only illumination, a narrow bubble of brightness amidst the slowly dripping walls to help them dart around fallen stalactites.

Then they came to a drop that led straight down. It couldn’t have been a fraction the width and depth of the cliffs of Kingdom’s Edge proper, but in the deepening shadows it seemed fathomless and yawning to Ghost. It was pitch black.

Something tugged at the back of their memory as they stood at the edge and looked down and couldn’t see the bottom, could hardly see the beginning of the path’s descent, but felt the breeze on their mask that warned it was deep enough to fall into and lose themself. Ghost took a step back and hugged the lumafly to their chest in the place of the pressure of their claws, trying to drag themself back to stable ground with the cool weight of the glass in their hands as white masks and the grasping dark tried to claw to the forefront of their mind.

They refused to go easily. Hornet stood crouched at the precipice, probably mapping their way down. Ghost edged to her side and carefully tugged at her shawl with gently shaking claws. Hornet looked up, scowling as usual to be interrupted.

“I know you’re impatient, but give me a minute more. I rarely come this way to begin with, and even rarer by foot.” She told them defensively.

Ghost shook their head and held out their hand, trying and mostly succeeding to quell the shaking where their void twisted and curled anxiously.

Hornet looked at their open palm and back at them. “You will need to be more specific. Do I have something you want?”

They shook their head and reached over to tap at the back of her hand, and reopened theirs.

“You want to… Hold my hand?” Hornet asked flatly.

Ghost nodded. An anchor, a reminder.

“I… Suppose. Are you frightened?” Hornet asked as she grasped their smaller claws in hers, and felt them shake.

Ghost nodded again, slower. That wasn’t quite right. It wasn’t truly the dark that scared them, nor the heights. But something about both, together…

It was what their mind told them lay at the bottom, for all they knew that it couldn’t be so. Ghost wasn’t entirely sure what they were afraid they’d fall into down there (and the word ‘fall’ made their void shiver), but the flashes of image and instants of ghostly sensation made them never want to know. They were afraid, because they knew something that had truly terrified them kept telling them to be wary of the indiscernible abyss.

But Hornet’s hand in their own was warm and solid and gripped theirs with only honest concern, nothing like the cold and sharp and the desperate, countless claws they kept remembering. It was something very different to focus on, and it worked, as Hornet led them to the edge and they made a short jump to the first section of narrow path, jutting like a fracture from the stone, descending down below the Kingdom.

With Hornet, Ghost knew they wouldn’t fall. They still shook, and they couldn’t look down without the chill of dread in their belly, but if they kept their gaze resolutely on Hornet’s back where she craned uncomfortably to keep a hold of their hand, the dull red of her shawl under bright, but limited, lumafly light shifting beneath the gleam of her nail, the descent became bearable.

And so they crept downwards until the darkness began to brighten, pushed back by the glow of something golden and hazy. No sooner had Ghost spotted what looked like great windows of frosted glass, angular in an unfamiliar way and backlit by a honeyed, banked light, when Hornet spoke up again.

“We are near the borders of the Hive, one of the few powers strong enough to hold against the Pale King’s rule. A warm, if insular little kingdom, unforgiving of change. When I was young I was trained and partly educated among them, and received my name. ‘Hornet’ is a fairly unusual name for a spider, even a half-spider.” Hornet laughed quietly, the noise welcome amidst the echoing quiet.

Something seemed to occur to her, and she glanced back at them over her shoulder. “I never actually asked your name, did I?”

Ghost thought it sort of hilarious that she was only realizing this now, apropos of nothing. They shrugged.

“Hm. Well, if I must call you something, it might as well be that. Unless you would prefer I didn’t?” Hornet asked skeptically.

Ghost would have laughed if they could at her complete confidence in her choice. It was a little exasperating, for all that they truly liked their name, that she wasn’t so much asking them what they’d like to be called as offering an opportunity to have her pick something else. But, it was very in line with what they knew of her; sensible and realistic, and not especially prone to looking for other opinions. Ghost was well aware they had no real way of offering up an alternative yet, and was equally aware that Hornet knew that just as well.

And it wasn’t out of the question that she’d just fallen into the practice of habitually assigning names to people she’d never spoken to, for her own reference. Hornet was not the sort to instigate unnecessary conversation with unfamiliar parties, and she seemed exactly the sort to be just paranoid enough never to take the steps to make those parties familiar anyway.

Ghost had no idea if that theory was actually the case, but it would make sense. Particularly considering that she’d named them without hesitation when they’d met with her in the City of Tears, as though that were a perfectly normal thing to do to someone one, at that time, hardly knew. Ghost could not be considered an expert of social niceties, but they thought it wasn’t. They wondered how that went over with other bugs, who would probably have names and take considerably more offense to being given one.

It was fortunate for both of them, then, that Ghost loved their name.

They glanced up as though considering for a moment, just long enough for Hornet to begin to frown at them, and then shook their head.

“Good, I like it too.” Hornet agreed and looked away to triangulate their next jump to a lower path, apparently considering the matter closed.

Ghost shook their head fondly, though Hornet didn’t see, and allowed her to pull them along.

It wasn’t much longer until Hornet informed them that she could see the bottom. “There’s a bed of stalagmites along much of the cavern floor. I’m going to have to jump over it. Come here,” She waited until they opened their arms to be picked up and then hefted them off the stone and let them wrap themself tightly around her torso.

Ghost hid their face in her front as she reared back and threw her needle, anticipating the uncomfortable dread of uncontrolled flight and still taken off guard by the lurch of their void when, with a quick leap into the air, Hornet darted after her weapon. The entire process took only a handful of seconds, and then they were on the ground again.

Hornet must have picked up that they weren’t one for her preferred means of travel, because she didn’t complain as she prised them off with careful claws and set them back on the ground with a quick pat to smooth out their cloak.

Even such a quick and efficient flight had made Ghost jittery, but here at the bottom of the drop and with nothing fearful to show for it they could finally convince themself of their safety. Just ahead was a tram signpost, angled down to point into a round-edged opening in the cavern floor leading further into the dark.

From there it wasn’t a long journey at all. Hornet noted a handful of little buzzing bugs, bees, to them as they made their way past, and forbade them from killing any, to Ghost’s disappointment. There were pits of crawling, writhing horned worms, which Hornet leapt past without any indication she found them intimidating and Ghost regarded with utmost suspicion.

And then there was the glow of another lumafly lamp up ahead, affixed over a signpost that, from what Ghost saw of the simpler glyphs, indicated a time schedule.

The tram itself wasn’t very impressive, in Ghost’s opinion.

Ghost thought they’d probably seen better elsewhere, only taking from their own lack of reaction to something fairly unlike anything they’d seen so far in Hallownest, or maybe that they were somewhat prejudiced against it by liking the Stagways already. The latter seemed more likely, as they wondered what the Stag would have to say about the creaking old thing as they climbed aboard after Hornet and listened to it shift on its rails with a muffled screech of metal.

“I recall it in much better condition.” Hornet said critically, absently brushing the accumulated dust off of a handrail as she passed it by. Every step caused the tram to creak and shift alarmingly, but Hornet didn’t seem unnerved by it in the least, so Ghost was forced to assume the unsteadiness wasn’t unusual.

At the far end, Hornet dug around in her little bag for a while until she produced a tiny, scuffed metal pass. Ghost saw that it was heavily singed on one end and looked at Hornet questioningly.

And wasn’t it fortunate that she was usually right on the money about what they were asking? “I wouldn’t just keep dead weight on me,” She said defensively, scraping a little at the built-up carbon with a claw. “It’s useful for campfires.”

Ghost couldn’t imagine how, and had never seen her use it for one, but they let the matter drop to examine the big, glowing button that lit up when Hornet inserted her pass into the terminal. As if by its own volition, their hand crept towards its appealing domed surface.

“Go ahead,” Hornet said with amusement as Ghost battled the urge to press it without knowing what it did, though that argument was quickly losing out. “It will take us where we want to go.”

Ghost jumped up and down in place once in, for once, uncomplicated excitement and slammed their hand down over the button.

An acknowledging sound chimed and the whole tram lurched in place, swaying forward and back and making Ghost scrabble for handholds on the smooth metal terminal and Hornet grab at the back of the nearest seat. Then, as the swaying slowed and mechanisms somewhere above clicked into order, the tram began to creep along its line, gaining speed until they were trundling along at what Ghost thought was a slow pace for a mechanical transport, but also decided was about as fast as they were comfortable with the rickety old thing moving anyway.

Outside the windows was only the unchanging black of the tunnel wall as they moved further from the tram stop. Ghost looked out one for a minute or so, trying to peer past the enveloping darkness, but it began to give them the same confused discomfort as traveling a long road through the Stagways and they looked, instead, back at Hornet, who had sat herself down on a plush seat with her legs kicked over the next and now gazed out the window at nothing.

Ghost made their way over, careful not to upset the tram, and sat down beside her.

Hornet was silent for several minutes, quietly waiting out the ride, and then sighed. “I should be worried. The trams seem so easy to disrupt, anyone or anything could cut the line while we sit here, miles from the entrance and miles more from the exit. I’ve always wondered what I would do, in that event. I think I’d wait. That’s what all the warnings said, when such things still mattered.”

Hornet chuckled humorlessly. “Sit still and wait for help. What a reassuring thought, that here in the dark one needed only to wait and help would come.”

She blinked, and seemed to realize Ghost was staring at her. “I’m sorry. It’s so easy to speak to you, when I… When I trust you as I do. One day we’ll learn to speak together, and then you can tell me how annoying it is to listen to me all the time.” Her eyes narrowed in a friendly way, like she was imagining something nice.

Ghost nodded slowly, meaningfully. Ghost didn’t think they could ever find what Hornet had to say annoying, but the prospect of talking _back_ to her sounded better than anything they could imagine. Someday soon, they vowed.

Ghost reached inside themself and picked out a page of paper and their worn pen and half-empty inkwell, and shakily wrote out something she’d taught them when last she’d had the chance.

“’Teach word.’” Hornet read aloud when they offered it to her. “Well, we aren’t doing anything else, and I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep for a while yet. To begin, here is how one phrases, ‘please teach me to write,’” Hornet offered teasingly, and they spent the rest of the tram ride quietly talking and writing as the clicking mechanics of the tram rumbled and moved ever on around them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It is a little strange that Hornet just. Named them. Out of the blue. But all's well that ends well, right? I'm no better at naming things, so I can't judge. There's at least 4 brief OCs in this fic and I named none of them. The Hollow Knight gets like 3 names and literally none of them are actual names. Hell, I've been in the market for my /own/ name coming up on half a decade now. 
> 
> Also, who can resist big glowing buttons? No one.
> 
> And another thing, it's subtle, but you might have noticed Ghost is a slightly unreliable narrator. They change pronouns once they're sure which a person uses, specific words gain or lose capitalization as they take on new meaning, there is a difference, in their mind, between Void and void. This is entirely from their perspective, after all, and for all their ability Ghost didn't inherit prescience. Or did they??


	15. Trepidation of the Known

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What the Pale King left behind is more than a great, ruined kingdom.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Anger (directed, rightly, at the Pale King). 
> 
> Next chapter will have stronger warnings, because it'll take place in the Abyss and there's a lot... Associated with that. I'll do my best to tag appropriately.

By the time the tram pulled into the next stop, Ghost had half-memorized enough words to respond, vaguely and mostly alongside a gesture or hand motion to clarify their meaning some, to most of what Hornet asked so long as it was simple enough for a one or two-word answer.

Hornet assured them that their understanding was minimal and their handwriting atrocious, and then squeezed them into a short one-armed hug with only a moment’s hesitation and told them that both were quickly improving, which Ghost was sure meant she was pleased with their progress.

On their end, Ghost was nearly buzzing with excitement when they stepped off the tram, claws twitching, tracing the movements to write out words they recited mentally, tracking the shapes of glyphs with a clawtip in the air.

But immediately there was something off. It was brighter here, or at least not dark in the same way. Ghost could clearly see the paths ahead, and the tramway behind, the great carved stone halves sealing off the tunnel sliding closed with an echoing, scraping rasp of stone over stone. And yet, everything they could see was… Less, somehow. The dark of the tunnel and Kingdom’s Edge before that was deep and swallowing, but it had a richness to it that this place lacked utterly.

Even the ornately wrought metal of the tram landing was washed out and lifeless, and the only color that existed was that which they’d brought. Hornet’s shawl, a splash of life amongst the tired shadows, and the banked glow of the lights within the tram.

Hornet scanned the way before them with a sweep of her proud head, the white of her mask bold against the fade. “The Ancient Basin. It bears the weight of atrocities, charged in the very air.” She said.

Ghost thought she probably hadn’t meant literally, but even so they could see little spots of black, unreflecting of the light and moving so slowly that Ghost had initially thought they were only spattered, somehow perfectly circular, against the stone and metal. And now that Ghost saw them, drifting ever so slowly through the still, listless air, they knew why they seemed familiar.

There were so many, Ghost noticed distantly as Hornet leapt down into the wide, carved cavern below and began to climb lower, and Ghost followed her. The low ceiling was arched and filigreed, and broken iron fences lined the paths as they stooped ever lower, and Ghost realized that all they could hear were their footsteps and Hornet’s soft breathing, something they’d never have noticed except in the absence of all other sound.

The Basin was entirely quiet. It was unnervingly familiar, though they couldn’t place how.

As they moved deeper and deeper they began to come across shelled creatures, ever so faintly clicking over the washed-out stone, as colorless as the place they inhabited except for their eyes, burning orange brighter than any Ghost had seen, though that could well have been a trick of the contrast.

At any rate, Hornet said nothing to stop them as they stepped past her to drive their nail into the things, splashing color onto the ground for only a moment before it withered, faster and more completely than any above. Ghost’s disquiet settled some when they found the bugs still had soul to shed, same as any other, though even that tasted dim.

“Come here.” Hornet said quietly, her first words since she’d led them below the tram station.

When Ghost looked back to her, a little ahead of them where they’d stopped to run their claws over a stain of black moss descending from the ceiling, so dark they couldn’t trust that it would be solid and real until they had touched it themselves. Hornet was standing before a doorway, cut into the stone and set with the seal of Hallownest, the deeply carved symbol cast into such shadow that it could have been just another rounded stone embedded within the walls.

Ghost followed her as she led them inside, where the reflections of a shallow pool of water played tentatively across the curved far wall and over a statue huge and hunched.

It was of a bug they didn’t recognize, empty eyes bleeding black residue and sharp, pointed horns extending up towards the low ceiling, obligingly carved higher where the statue was at its tallest. It was menacing, clawed, demanding. About the base were the corpses of bugs, only a few, pale faces streaked with the black of rot and clothed in shades of white that still nearly glowed. Ghost looked back to Hornet for an explanation.

“This is the Pale King, or a representation of him.” She said softly, voice carefully flat. “Father of me, father of the Vessels, creator of Hallownest. Failed, deified king of a dead kingdom. I want you to have a face to put to the name. He owes you that much.”

Hornet breathed in slowly, and exhaled even slower. “Know that he was only a bug, in the end, for all that he was also a higher being, for all that he was a god. Do not think of him as something greater than he was. There was no excuse.”

Ghost stared up into the statue’s face with renewed interest, conflicted. Behind them, Hornet turned and left, her claws’ tapping muffled and quickly fading.

They found the eyes too dark to look at for long, and looked instead at the plaque in the carved edge of the pool. The writing was complex and ornate, looping over and around itself and spun into patterns, and all Ghost could make out with any clarity was, after some struggle, the first line; “A true servant gives all for the Kingdom.”

It made them sick with anger, mind instantly cast to the Hollow Knight waiting high above, and to Hornet still grimly pressing on far below the ground. How cruel the Pale King must have been, to demand all from his children and then have the audacity to _die_.

Ghost would give all. They would give all and not to the Kingdom, but to those within it who deserved their effort. Every bug, starting with the Hollow Knight. It would be a fine revenge, they thought, to begin giving everything the Pale King had taken _back_.

Ghost turned and left the little room without another look, and found Hornet waiting a little ways off outside. She glanced up when she heard their footsteps, and wordlessly they continued their journey together.

Hornet took them through a set of winding, stark tunnels, all shades of sterile grey, and then clambered up a steep, collapsed slope. Once they’d caught up with her, she turned without a word and led them out of the tunnels and into a massive cavern, the heights of which Ghost couldn’t see and the far side built up of cracked, ruined walls, small and dim in the distance.

They walked down a long stone bridge, seamless as though carved all at once from the solid stone and imposing in its grandeur. It was lined with lumafly lamps unlike those above, the metal more intricate and the edges sharper and intimidating.

And it led to nothing.

At the end of the bridge, long and pale and heavily stained with the dust and the shadows, there were only unrecognizable ruins and a single doorway, a massive and detailed seal of Hallownest, the six-winged carapace, its pointed wingspan still polished and gleaming darkly in the low light and the carapace, empty to serve as a door, still wider than Ghost was tall.

Next to it was an armored corpse, unmarred white save for the black creeping over its shell and into the hole in its armor where its face might have been.

“This was where the Palace Grounds lay. At one point it was… Much more well-lit.” Hornet remarked. “I don’t know where the Palace went. I’m not sure anyone does anymore, save perhaps the Queen. It may seem nonsense now, but it was wide enough to fill this hollow cavern and tall enough to scrape the ceiling, and might have held thousands of bugs as royals, servants, scholars, and any manner of professionals the King wanted on hand at its peak. It shone with pale light, said to inspire all who gazed upon it.”

Ghost looked over the vast empty space, barren save the odd shattered boulder-sized hunk of once-carved stone, and then away at the far wall. Without waiting for Hornet, they set off towards it.

“Wh- Ghost, where are you going? There’s nothing still here, that’s probably just an old storage room.” She waited, but Ghost didn’t stop, and they heard her give a frustrated huff and jog after them.

“I’ve been down here before, Ghost, and I’ve never found anything. What are you looking for?” Hornet said.

They weren’t certain, but it was a hunch worth investigating if it payed off.

The broken wall crept closer, lined with jagged spires of stone like hardened fangs and threaded, in the cracks so deep it might have been only shadows, with something black and too smoothly connected to be solely natural fractures in the rock. There was an entrance there, strewn with a few husks of bugs in the white of the Palace, that opened into a shallow dead end.

“See? There’s nothing.” Hornet said.

Ghost drew their nail and jabbed it into the broken stone with enough force that the fragments shifted around it, and then gripped it with both hands and heaved.

A handful of smaller pieces broke off and clattered to the ground, and then the entire unsteady pile of rock they’d taken as a mostly-crumbled wall collapsed to rubble before them, opening a new hall which glowed with lumafly light.

Ghost gave Hornet as smug a look as they could muster, and she grumbled irately and stepped past them, drawing her needle as she went.

The inside was a mostly untouched stag station, more pristine and decorated than the others, but only just. The same signs hung from the ceiling expressing something that must have been important when the station was still in use, the same dull brass bell, and the same dip in the floor foretold the track the Stag ran on. Huge, dark roots crowded part of the room, long-dead and stained nearly black, and what floor wasn’t open was taken up predominantly by huge spools of silk.

Hornet crossed over to one of the spools and neatly located its end. She drew out a short strand, thick and light grey in her hand, and frowned. “This is from the Weavers. Very high-quality silk, and charged with song, for protection. Defense. How did they get this?” She murmured. “What could they have traded, what would they have used it for?”

She tucked the end of the thread securely back into the spool. “I suppose they’ve no use for it now. Perhaps no one ever will.”

Ghost watched her, aware there was some significance they were missing and knowing no way to ask what, and then struck the bell with their nail. It resounded with a high, piercing ringing that made Hornet jump and glare at them, to which they only shrugged as they waited.

“Little Ghost, I doubt there’s a stag left to Hallownest now, it’s been so long since there was anyone to use the-“

Hornet was cut off by the distant sound of galloping, growing quickly closer, and then the Stag barreled full-tilt into the station, skidding to a halt before the platform.

“Little wanderer!” The Stag boomed, lifting his head over the platform edge even before he’d entirely ground to a stop so that Ghost could scratch beneath his tangled beard. “How long it has been, how far you have traveled! What station have you found, hidden all the way at the bottom of the world?”

“And who is this? Another traveler of the stagways?” He asked, craning his head to better peer at Hornet, who peered right back with astonishment.

“Not in living memory.” Hornet replied dryly.

The Stag grunted dismissively. “Then perhaps today shall be the day. You’ve discovered quite an astounding place, little one!” He addressed Ghost. “Until I heard the bell calling, I didn’t even know the Stagways ran so deep. But, ah,” He exclaimed hoarsely. “Such a quiet place this is. Not even the whispers of the Resting Grounds, here all the world holds its breath.”

Ghost nodded emphatically, and Hornet stepped closer.

“You know this stag, Ghost?” She asked, and Ghost noticed she still had her needle in hand.

They nodded quickly, giving the Stag a pat on his tall, arching horn.

The Stag grumbled appreciatively. “They have called upon me more than once in their travels. Never will I refuse the bell, nor abandon these old stagways, but I am glad to carry one such as them where they might wish to wander.”

Hornet hummed in acceptance. “It would have saved me some stress tracking you those first few weeks, had I known you’d been along the stagways.” She remarked.

Ghost shrugged, quietly amused by the thought.

Hornet narrowed her eyes at them as though considering if they’d given her the runaround on purpose, then turned back to the Stag. “Do you know the ways to the City of Tears?”

“Yes, of course!” The Stag replied. “The paths have been opened in my memory, and my claws recall the way.”

Hornet made an appreciative noise. “Good. That will save us some time. That, I believe, would be a good next stop. Not yet though,” She said as the Stag began to kneel down to allow them onto his back.

“We still have business in these empty places. Are you ready to go, Ghost?”

“Ghost? Is that your name, little wanderer?” The Stag asked, shaking off his disappointment with curiosity.

They noticed Hornet watching them out of the corner of her eye as they nodded with enthusiasm, and saw her relax some. One day they would tell her how dearly they loved the name she’d given them, Ghost thought. They hadn’t known she’d worried they didn’t like it. It made them feel a little bad for messing with her when she’d asked, earlier, and for assuming she’d been wholly confident of it.

“Ahh, it suits.” The Stag grunted approvingly. “Until we meet again, little Ghost.”

Ghost nodded to him and ran after Hornet, waiting near the hall.

The walk back down that long, pale path was a quiet one, but lighter. Ghost was glad they’d stopped to find the stag station, and spoken to the Stag; the quiet and pressing loneliness of the place, in spite of Hornet’s presence by their side, was beginning to wear on them.

Hornet, for her part, seemed pleased as well, though for different reasons. “That was a good call, little Ghost. Forgive me for doubting you. If I’d known the stag stations were still operational, I might have saved us quite a lot of travel. As it is, we stand to save days or weeks.”

Ghost couldn’t quite tell her that the old Stag was, at best, only reliably capable of finding perhaps three or four stations at this point, so they nodded along. She’d find out sooner or later. It had hardly occurred to them that they’d also need to travel _back_ from this far beneath Hallownest, so to have Hornet point it out and just as quickly have a solution presented was an immeasurable relief.

They didn’t relish the idea of climbing back _up_ into the Kingdom’s Edge.

But Hornet quickly became grim and reticent once more as she led them away from the palace grounds and down tunnels that delved deeply into the earth, when they’d thought there was no deeper to go. Soon the way was once again shrouded and dark, and void hung like silent visions in the air, telling of ancient wounds and the cruelty of ages past, still haunting their home and refusing to fade.

Ghost had never been here before, at least that they could remember, but the way seemed obvious once Hornet led them to it. The air became stiller, the black weeds thicker, the blacker spots and lost points of void more common. Ghost, too, quickly lost whatever good spirits talking to their friend had given them as the darkness closed in all around.

Ghost knew they had to be far below Hallownest, could almost hear the groaning of the stone around them under the weight of so much above, and they couldn’t think anyone would intentionally delve so far without good cause, even as the void around them matched their own chill in a way that was profoundly familiar. It nagged at the back of their mind.

There was something _here_ , something they _knew_ , and it was startling in that walking these paths was, in a way, as natural as holding their nail.

Like the dark, this uncanny, engrained, infinitely familiar dark, the absence they could see in better than light, was so comfortable that they hardly registered it until they _made_ themself do so. As though, though they’d only hours ago seen it for the first time, it had long since been so routine that they were blind to it.

Ghost had never been here before. But they knew the touch of the void around almost as they knew their own. It was discomfiting, just as much as it tried to lull them into its familiarity. The understanding at the back of their mind that this void was completely passive, that it had never done anything before and never, ever would.

It was less an understanding, really, and more a certainty, like how they knew water was wet and fire was hot, fundamental and unchallenged.

Hornet, walking alongside them, had no such worries, or at least not the same kind. Her eyes never slowed, the slow pan of her head never stopped, and she left not an inch of the paths they walked unwatched. Where Ghost was fighting the urge to ignore the void around them completely and look only for the exceptions, peculiarities in the black, as something to watch for, Hornet looked at every drop and pool and mist of void like it held something deadly.

Maybe it did. Ghost was of the Void itself, cold and still, and like this it wouldn’t be able to do anything to them. Hornet was of bug and wyrm, a creature of warmth and light and action, nothing like the void in any respect.

Nothing at all.

The thought made them keep a closer eye on her as she kept her own close eye on the shadows, alert enough for them both. Maybe even this was too close, too much void for her to bear.

Was it cold, to her? Did it leech at her vivacity, making her more like it? Something about the idea rang loud and alarmed with a sight they couldn’t quite touch in their mind, and Ghost nearly asked her to turn around and leave.

But if Hornet was weakening or frightened, herself, she wasn’t letting on. If anything she seemed more alert and on-edge than ever, wary of what might come and doubly so that she couldn’t know what it was, but that was all.

Ghost noticed she never let even a drop of void touch her.

Then the path ahead dropped suddenly and Hornet jumped into it without hesitation, leaving Ghost to follow. And before them, down a wide cavern with walls scraped artlessly from the stone in great unrefined sweeps by claw or tool, framed and dug through with towering darkly stained roots, was the King’s seal, coldly glowing and acerbic in the dim, and next to that, a warning.

Ghost wasn’t sure how they knew it was a warning, but the sight of the huge tablet, settled as though grown cancerously from within the jagged, curved shell of a great black egg encircling it, struck them with regret and deep revulsion not their own.

They didn’t even need to hear the words whispered to the seal engraved deeply into its wide surface to read that, but they listened anyway alongside Hornet, who craned closer as though the voice wasn’t as clear as a bell.

“Higher beings, these words are for you alone.” It murmured to them. “Our pure Vessel has ascended. Beyond lies only the refuse and regret of its creation.”

“We shall enter that place no longer.” The voice sighed, and faded into the encompassing silence like it had never been. The voice, this time, drove shivers down Ghost’s back. They’d heard it before. Long ago.

“Could you hear it?” Hornet asked quietly, as though unwilling to pierce the heavy silence in the wake of that cold voice. “It has only ever been a voice on the wind to me, too faint to make out.”

Ghost nodded, feeling a sick suspicion begin to twist in their chest, encouraged by the constant awareness of the airborne void around them, so saturated in the air that it didn’t dissipate, separate from any body but drawn to no source. Cut off.

Bled.

Hornet was silent for a moment, her quiet breathing the only sound in what felt like all the world.

“I cannot come with you.” She said softly, just the faintest whisper and yet unmistakable here, and Ghost reached out and took her hand in theirs, needing the comfort and something not the cold and the dark to hold onto.

“I cannot.” Hornet repeated. “Whatever is beyond this seal, I can feel it. It is empty, and wanting, and cold in a way I cannot withstand. I am not a creature of Void, little Ghost. It would consume me. Passively, slowly, like the still death in snow, but I could not survive it.” She said and gripped their hand tightly before letting go.

“Be cautious. Be brave. I know you’re strong; prove it once more.” Hornet ordered them, eyes gleaming, black but reflective of the light in the way no void was. It was more reassuring, the life in that same color, than Ghost thought made sense. And yet.

Ghost nodded once, then again with more surety. They turned to the great seal and felt the brand on their hand burn cold and commanding. The seal burned as well, but with light and brilliance, so bright they nearly couldn’t watch as, with a deafening crack like neatly shattered bone, it broke down the middle and sections of it began to glow even brighter, white like soul and cold like ice and cruelty.

It flashed, and then it was gone, the solid door dissolved to white particles quickly fading into the still, dark air. Ghost took a step forward, then another, into the darkness. If before it was consuming, now it was absolute, yet they found they could still see through it.

They knew it too well not to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I saw all the void floating around in the Ancient Basin as maybe a little more morbid than it was. It was probably just supposed to be because the Void was so close by, but it's the same effect as when Ghost gets hit except that it doesn't fade away. Would that mean that the air is just too saturated with void for it to dissipate? Is void shed from a Vessel a little different from regular, drippy void? Would that, in turn, imply that enough Vessels died there to permanently saturate the area with airborne void?
> 
> Inquiring minds want to know.


	16. Be Still

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Abyss is home to ghosts, and regrets, and both still have claws to tear.
> 
> Chapter Warnings!!! : Bad panic attack, mention of haphephobia and claustrophobia, sensory memory flashback, angst(!), confrontations with mortality, past child death, horror, Ghost is in a bad way most of the chapter. Aside from the emotions, essentially canon-typical events and environments, but ramped up.

They knelt on the frigid metal and looked down into the Abyss, desaturated and lifeless. It felt wrong.

It felt like, somehow, it shouldn’t have been so quiet here, even though the Ancient Basin had been almost entirely silent itself. Something was missing and they could not remember what, and it set them on edge even as the void saturating the air felt as familiar as their own, trying still to lower their guard.

Ghost gazed into the unfathomable deep. It was so dark, and they were at the mouth of it, the very tip that plummeted down much, much further than they could see, and this dark, while familiar, was a waiting one. It wasn’t as empty as void should be. Whatever they were so frightened of finding at the bottom, they’d find it here.

Ghost nearly couldn’t move, bolted in place, but there was something other than fear this time as they gazed into the Abyss. A sort of curiosity, they thought, razor-sharp and unavoidable and hungry and fighting them as they stood locked at the precipice.

They had to know. Ghost _had_ to know what about the Abyss had terrified them in so many ways for so long.

And then, there was also their siblings to consider. It was all for them, wasn’t it? Could they live with themself if they could not face this last, greatest dread?

For those relying upon them, they would do this and anything else, Ghost thought and leapt off the ledge without any more hesitation, sinking quickly into the dark.

The silence was absolute. Ordinary sound was all but vanished here, no groan of shifting rock or murmur of distant voices or the buzzing of wings, or even the rush of water or the creak of aging iron. Even the tap of their light steps, when they landed on crumbling and decayed ancient stone, was quickly swallowed by the black. It was somehow heavier than the silence of the Basin, filled by intent and something akin to what Ghost felt when they’d stood at the graves of the Resting Grounds.

If the Basin had been the silence of abandonment, the Abyss was the hushed, oppressive silence of many waiting as one, voiceless. The endless watch over old graves, and the vigil from the grave itself.

The creatures here were, for their part, much the same as before, creeping slowly over their high paths and making hardly any noise with their many legs. The thickly armored bugs were eerily unresponsive and their eyes burned like candleflame, but it was a comfort that anything survived here, among the untouchably familiar.

Familiar and not right. There was something missing, Ghost’s vantage point felt all wrong, distant.

And then they found the first mask.

They stopped abruptly, seeing the dull white resting next to them on the next step down. It was much duller than their own, they noted blankly as they stared at it, and unhealthy. It was dry, in a way a dead carapace didn’t get in the kingdom above, the long years in the unchanging, unshifting Abyss only weakening the matrix of the little shell with its single set of pronged horns, so like their own, so like someone else’s they could remember so faintly, whose outline, if they looked up, they could almost see against the still-visible opening.

They were born of the same void, but the void had taken everything this mask had to give, all the brilliant white sapped and ground into the fragile graying latticework of the delicate cracks spiderwebbing over the surface, originating from a brutal, gaping hole and furthered by time and age, only visible when they got to their knees and looked closely. Ghost picked up the mask and the surface crumbled in their hands, dusting them in a faint powder of off-white.

They looked into the empty eyes and saw the darker white of the back behind the face. Ghost’s void crawled within them, as though to remind them that within their own mask there was still solid, dripping black. This was another of their siblings, they knew. One who had come perilously close to either Ghost’s or the Hollow Knight’s fates, so far from the Abyss floor.

The chitin was so frail in their gently quaking hands. They set it down with care, but as they did one of the blunt little horns, more affected by the big crack that had probably killed them, crumbled entirely into fragments.

Ghost snatched their hands back and staggered to their feet, nearly backing off the ledge, their mind filled with clawing and closeness and bodiless masks, pale in the gloom.

It wasn’t like their sibling in Greenpath. They had seemed a traveler in their own right, and Ghost knew they had carved out a place of their own in the world. They’d had a nail, they’d been small but they’d been away from here. They were akin to every corpse and unfortunate adventurer Ghost had ever seen. This was different.

This sibling had never known anything but the crushing darkness.

They turned abruptly and dropped further into the dark, forcing themself to move and use every bit of maneuverability they possessed to stave off the tightness in their chest, and began to see more and more of the little death markers. Two here, three more there, a cluster around a growth of precariously jagged spikes, one cracked nearly in half just below, and so on. They began to dread in spite of their efforts, but they didn’t slow down again. They couldn’t hesitate any longer, or they’d freeze.

And then they were at the bottom, landed abruptly in a bed of clacking bone, and remembered why their waking nightmares always featured white faces, and black hands. Here were the faces, hundreds and thousands of them. The hands were long stilled, and long gone. Each mask looked like their own. Siblings, clutchmates, and the only time they’d known each other Ghost could only remember in their worst moments.

And now Ghost was all that was left. How many Hallownests of their own kin had never left their birthplace? They stood motionless in place, desperately fighting down panic, and realized why it felt so quiet.

There had been calls before the Hollow Knight’s. Since the moment they’d hatched, close to last, their siblings had been calling and crying and screaming and there had never been anything they could do. They had all wanted so desperately to escape, united in their shared pain and yet blinded by their agony and newness.

Even if they could have done something, Ghost suddenly knew, they wouldn’t have known to do it. They, all of them, had only been born knowing one thing; there was a light above that called them back.

Terrified and crowded and dying in the dark, it was all they could do to follow it, blindly. How much of making it to the very ledge had been inborn ability, and how much had been pure, dumb luck?

But there was something wrong with that thought, something out of place. It wasn’t exactly right.

It had been good that they’d forgotten this place, Ghost thought as they saw a mask they thought they recognized, in the way that every mask was nearly recognizable from their half-known memory. If they had known, truly remembered how many had not had the chance they did, they would never have left Hallownest to wander purposeless among foreign lands.

If they hadn’t been so new during their lucky flight, they would have realized that there was something they could do.

Behind Ghost, breaking them from their stupor, there was a quiet, wistful noise. They turned and their void jumped eagerly, sensing companionship that the darkness always craved as they hoped beyond hope for a bright instant.

But there was no sibling there. Only two bright eyes set into a shadow, thin and wavering, watching them. Ghost’s carapace crawled at the sight.

It began to drift closer and Ghost drew their nail in warning, but the shade picked up speed and then it was drifting at them startlingly fast, no faster than Ghost could run but alarmingly quick for that it made no further sound.

Ghost finally slashed with their blade and it was cut in two. The shadow, already linked together by the barest threads of memory, separated and drifted apart and then dissipated, adding its meager void to the ambient shadows floating in the still air. It made a soft sound as it went, like the remembrance of a sigh.

Hallownest was filled with ghosts, and what was the Abyss if not a basin of regrets to form them? It must have been a powerful grief, to have persisted for so long on only a brief, terrible wrong.

Ghost kept their nail in hand and began to search.

It was a tellingly long and treacherous walk, during which they stumbled into gaping eyes and over jutting horns more than once and cut down more than a dozen broken shades of their siblings. One took them by surprise, and Ghost found that, though weak, the void was still sharp.

They were aggressive in their pain, lashing out, incognizant of their sibling and probably of everything else, too. It made Ghost’s chest ache with the gnawing understanding that they, too, might have been so vicious if they’d met their end down here.

They would have, they thought ruefully as they dashed another shade away with their nail. They’d lived so long out beyond Hallownest because they’d never been afraid to defend themself. How quickly, when reduced to a shade, would that turn to heedless aggression?

And then they came upon the lighthouse, looming in the dark and thick with shadow, at the shore of a void sea. _The_ Void Sea, probably, Ghost couldn’t imagine a vaster expanse, or a deeper one. When they stepped close to the shore the void reacted violently, lashing out with sharpened tendrils spiked with the imprints of blades, deeper than the dark. They peered over the rippling depths, but in the gloom the other shore wasn’t visible.

If the rest of the Abyss was dark, this sea was purest black. They gazed into it and noticed their own bit of void was very still, preternaturally frozen in place. Ghost realized they didn’t feel very much at all. Not hungry, not the ever-present ache in their feet, not regretful, not burdened or light.

This, they thought as though uncovering the words from heavy silt, was an offer.

Minutes dragged on and the Void gave them an offer, beckoning without feeling and without words for Ghost to simply sink into it and never be seen again.

They stood very still and their grip on their nail loosened, and they searched muddily for a reason in their suddenly blank mind not to accept. It wouldn’t be so quiet there, in this unending sea where their siblings and they had come from and where their siblings had left them to go. It would be secure, and they would never worry again, safe where they had begun. It would be the snuffing out of the Knight, of Ghost, and the reunion of the Void.

Ghost could not think, standing still and quiet as the dead masks around them, their will misplaced, and they only stood and waited.

The Void did not lie, to say that it wouldn’t kill them more surely than any other death would be untrue. It only offered what it had offered every child of Void who had come before it. A type of peace, and a certain unity other than that the Radiance extended.

Ghost could not accept.

They gripped their nail and remembered their last siblings, high above them and reliant upon their strength. Ghost couldn’t rest until they could, too. They would not run again.

Ghost ascended the lighthouse and ended the remains of the shades that threw themselves at them, those who had perhaps refused the Void themselves for their own reasons. They’d needed to use their remaining soul to keep their strength in ascending, but though now that they were farther from the Sea and once again able to properly think and feel, and they knew they should be hungry, exhausted and tired, they found they weren’t. To sustain their own void they needed only exist in the charged atmosphere of the Abyss, where the void had seeped into the air so thoroughly it condensed and drifted.

Inside the lighthouse was every indication of the Pale King’s influence. A huge egg of perfect glass held in place by sharp points of iron reaching down from the ceiling took up most of the little room, a single stubborn bastion against the dark, and before it was a switch, and then beside both was the crumpled corpse of a pale-robed bug. Ghost felt they should have resented them, so obviously compliant with what had been done, but they found that after the calm of the Void Sea, all they could feel was pity.

They’d died down here, alone in the dark. Maybe they’d been terrified of what they’d done. Maybe they’d only stayed out of loyalty. Maybe they’d been cut off, sealed in by the final door.

Ghost struck the lever and ignited the beacon, filling it with brilliance in an instant and casting its light out and over the Sea.

Outside, the expansive void was tempered by the beacon’s blinding illumination. The brilliance was antithesis to the nothing of the Void, but in its own nest all that even such a powerful light accomplished was a stalemate, and the surface of the Sea was still.

It would still take them if they touched it carelessly, but for now it slept. They vowed that it would not have them, at least not until they were done and their siblings saved.

Ghost jumped in, landing with a muted splash that made no sound even as the void rippled around them, and began to swim. They kept conscious stock of themself as they did so, taking care to neither take in too much or to leave any of their own void behind as their carapace, only a thin replication of a real bug’s body to begin with, ceased to exist where it touched the inky black.

Against their will and in spite of their best efforts, they began to feel how deeply the Void ran. For how large it seemed, it _felt_ still larger. Condensed, containing much more even than it looked to. Ghost thought that it might not have a bottom, but instead extended infinitely downward, and however ridiculous the thought was, the image stuck even as they reached the opposite shore and clambered out onto it, scrubbing their hands over their limbs to make sure they were all intact before continuing on.

The far shore closed into a narrow passage, thick with limp black strands that might once have been plant life, ancient and fed up on void until they couldn’t die or grow any longer. Ghost made their way through the claustrophobic tunnels, just high enough in places for them to walk through without scraping their horns on the ceiling, and sometimes even then needing to cut the void-plants to pass. They fell to the ground without a sound, though Ghost’s nail was loud enough when it sliced through them.

It wasn’t long before the tunnels opened again and they stepped into a larger room, the air filled with void so dark even Ghost couldn’t see through it clearly.

There they found a wellspring that intrigued them. It was void, yes, offered from an overflowing dish by a corpse that had been a corpse so long stone had crept up its reaching arms and across its carapace, and it was melded to the equally grey stone behind it, but this void had no voice or offer. Where the Sea had a presence, an implication of the many in the one, the black spring felt… Inert.

If the Sea was the great beast, the fountain was its pooled blood.

Ghost scrambled up and perched on the bony arms of the fossil-corpse and splashed a hand into the void it held. Immediately it was swallowed up by the inky blackness, and they realized that while they couldn’t see it beneath the surface, neither could they feel it, no matter how they flexed their claws. They pulled their hand out hastily and examined it, but as soon as it was free of the void it was whole and sound again, if a little cold.

Could this be the source of the void used to create them? Passive enough to be incorporated into a Vessel, purely void and the cold and the dark, enemy of the Radiance without dream or intent yet still living that, so the Pale King had perhaps theorized, would create a being of the same qualities when introduced to an egg?

How foolish, Ghost thought, to think that any creature born of one with such potent dreams as the Pale King would not also dream.

If this was that substance their father had used, then it was already part of them. A thought occurred to them, and before they could talk themself out of it they stepped into the spring.

Without hesitation the void crawled up their legs, then their torso, and as soon as they registered that their body had gone entirely and coldly numb, it closed over their head.

And for a moment they were only the burn of their guilt and regret.

They felt their sibling’s ripping white-hot pain and consuming betrayal and the ice in their own heart when they’d felt the Hollow Knight accept their fate, layered with their own breaking claws scraping raw and bleeding and pushing them up, up, past masks and thorns and ragged stone and hearing past the terrified rush of their own void the endless, equally terrified cries of countless siblings. The expanding, horrible ice-weight of abandonment of their own, like a growing, disbelieving scream, left in the dark forever.

Mindless.

And then the void retreated and they could think again.

Ghost, disoriented, scrabbled to climb out of the bowl and toppled over the edge, falling without concept of where the floor might be for a heart-stopping second before they cracked against the hard stone. Their sight clouded dangerously, but they only curled into themself on the floor and shook.

They had been hurt by the fall, judging only by the sound their body made when it hit the dry rock, they noted distantly as their void thrashed and trembled and cried out. The void hurt more, the pounding of it overwhelming as they shuddered violently with their hands pressed over their eyes.

For a while, time blurred and they could only think of the endless pit of their siblings, and to their unending guilt that made them dig sharp claws into the hard, unfeeling bone of their mask and dug claws still sharper into their chest and crushed their heart, they could not think if they were more terrified of being trapped beneath them all as they struggled and writhed or of being passively, endlessly buried by their empty masks.

The burden of the living, or of the dead.

Ghost shudderingly curled closer into themself and desperately wanted Hornet, or Quirrel, Oro, anyone to come and save them, to tell them stories or hold them close or reassure them that they were safe and protected, anything to distract them, anything to make it all stop.

They wanted the Hollow Knight, but the Hollow Knight was far away yet.

They had been like one of their shade-siblings for only a single, unbearable moment.

Ghost stayed there beneath the void-spring, silently trembling and drowning and slowly, slowly battling back the memory and the fear. For a frighteningly long time it seemed that it would never abate, and that they might spend forever here in the cold and the dark caught with their chest tight and their eyes covered and the guilt eating them alive, unable to conceive of the ability to think of anything but how badly they had misjudged, how foolish they were, how wrong they’d been to think that the void was empty and thoughtless anymore.

But eventually, after an exhaustingly long time, they clawed back their ability to focus and calmed the frantic void writhing within them, stilling it enough to notice that it felt different.

Ghost sat up stiffly, slowly uncurling one limb after another and feeling empty and drained. They raised a shaking hand to rub at one of their eyes. They were cold, and leaking void from a fracture in the chitin just above their wrist, and they felt that they would have deeply appreciated company, but of course there was no one but they still alive in the Abyss.

Their void was different. Not alarmingly so, at least not comparatively, and certainly it was still solidly theirs, but it felt denser. Like there was more of it, or like it had gained focus, intent.

They felt they understood it better.

Ghost stood up and staggered as their head swam, but kept their footing. It was time to go, there was nothing left here to discover, and they dearly wanted to not be alone for a while.

They made their way in a daze back to the edge of the sea, still docile, almost falling into it instead of jumping and mechanically swimming across. They hardly noticed that, this time, it didn’t try to take them.

There they drew their nail and shook themself into something resembling battle-ready alertness and began to make their stumbling way back across the floor of the Abyss.

It took significantly longer than before, and they were dead-tired by the time they reached the steep path out. Once they’d climbed out of this place, Ghost though muddily, they were going to badger Hornet until she let them both rest for a while, and they weren’t getting up until they could see straight.

They gazed upwards to where the door opened high above, feeling the chill settle around them like a blanket, weighted and solemn, as they stood alone far below in the dark.

Ghost thought longingly of warmth and light, there in that quiet, deep place, hidden away where no one might ever find it again. Perhaps after them no one ever would. Ghost hoped so. There wasn’t anything left here but the watching shadows, and the graves of nameless children. Ghost gathered themself to begin the ascent, aching in every inch.

The masks beneath their claws creaked, and that was all the warning they received before they gave way entirely and Ghost slipped beneath the surface, too quickly to panic and much too suddenly to do more than scrape helplessly at crumbling masks that gave and crunched and shifted beneath their claws, and watch the pale dark close in around them.

It was almost enough to freeze them in place. Every nightmare, every half-remembered crawling fear made real and pressing in on all sides. Faces too close, eyes not dark enough, empty and gaping. There were no claws, no silent voices, and the masks themselves were eroded and thin with the long years, but to Ghost it made little difference.

Again, they could hear crying and feel so distinctly the scrape of fearful hands over their body, battered and pushed and held _down_. They were too close, they were all too close, and Ghost never wanted to be touched by something so cold or so heavy ever again. Their void, settled and tired into quietude, thrashed as though to shake itself free, and it _screamed_. Ghost wished they could do the same, as much as they could think at all past the blinding, rushing panic.

And then the masks beneath their kicking feet gave and they fell through into a cavity, a hollow in the pile made of delicate horns and cracked eyes, one atop the other. They landed heavily on their back and went rigid, shaking violently. Their claws dug mercilessly into the masks below, punching through the fragile bone and gripping until it began to crack and shatter. Ghost lay there, surrounded on all sides by the watchful, empty eyes of their kin, just as desperately grateful for the space as they were horrified of its cost.

Ghost looked slowly up, fighting with themself to move at all and terrified beyond reason of what they might see, or not see.

They were met with more staring faces, long dried and left to dust, and then the thin not-light of the empty Abyss above through the gap they’d made in the uppermost layer of Vessel remains.

Ghost stood up, shuddering so badly that it took a second try when the first sent them stumbling back down, but as they made to jump back out, they heard something catch their attention.

A small noise. Not the dry rasp of bone over bone, or the settling of dust and paper-thin fragments, and not the whisper of a sibling. More of an intentional, insistent tapping, like claws on glass. Ghost turned around in spite of themself, something painful catching in their throat, looking for the sound.

There’s no one here, they reminded themself even as they took a hesitant, careful step towards it. The thought was as painful as it was a relief, and the conflict made guilt rise in their throat. No one had been here for a very long time. But could they live with themself, if they didn’t check? If they weren’t _sure_?

Ghost knew they couldn’t. So in spite of every instinct to go, Ghost took another step. The little hollow they’d fallen into extended, uneven and narrow, deeper down, the walls rounded horns and the floors filled with holes ghoulish.

The realization nearly made them balk anyway, that in following it they’d be putting more between themself and the surface, and somewhere deep down it felt like the _wrong way_ , as though they were making an unforgivable, obvious mistake in digging deeper and further from what lay above.

In a way, Ghost supposed they were, but they went anyway, forcibly setting aside their terror for resolve. Fear would get them nowhere, and Ghost was not one to give in to fear if they could help it. Not when they were needed. And a task was exactly the distraction, the purpose, that would allow them to shove it down to deal with later. Find the sound, Ghost told themself, and leave. Make sure, and then go.

It was something to focus on, at least.

The tapping continued, growing louder as Ghost ventured ever deeper, inch by unsteady inch as they balanced more carefully now than they had above, trying as hard as they could not to shift the masks from where they’d settled and intensely aware that there could be another pocket just below this one, that might cave in entirely with any structural upset.

Their void made a giddy, anxious jump. And wasn’t that an unsettling thought, to think of the discarded masks of their siblings as building blocks to be destabilized?

The narrow path, just wide enough in places for Ghost to pass through without snagging their horns on anything, twisted and came to an end, and at the end was an egg.

It was big, and jagged, sharp as broken glass where it had been shattered and, supposedly, escaped. Its intact surface gleamed even in the absence of light, flawless and glossy black. It was empty, glittering little fragments of cut glass or shattered obsidian lining the inside like uneven, many-layered teeth.

Facing them was a smooth side, and reflected in its every detail on the exterior was their own face.

Ghost moved to get a closer look and saw their reflection move as well, that among all the other faces they’d taken as only another sibling, and this startled them so badly their hand leapt to the worn, familiar grip of their nail.

But it was only them. Ghost studied their reflection quietly, and tried not to think of how similar their siblings must have looked, all smooth black chitin and little sharp claws and pale faces.

Their reflection raised its claw and tapped the surface of the egg, tilted its head questioningly, and drew out the Dream Nail.

Ghost did the same on reflex, as though they were the reflection instead, and by the time their mind had caught up to their intuition they’d drawn the ornate handle back and it already flared with pink light, so bright in the dark and rebounded off the eggshell that Ghost couldn’t see past it as they struck blindly at the image in the black.

Ghost felt the force of the blow rebound and was insensate before they hit the masks below, the dull clatter of disrupted sleep lost to the waiting silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here's where it all starts to come to a head. This really did turn into the angstiest fix-it this side of the Mississippi, just because of this chapter and the next. Sorry Ghost.


	17. Wait

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Little changes in the Abyss, and what does is often from within.
> 
> Chapter Warnings! : Recently past accidental physical harm, trauma, abandonment, child death, morbidity, horror, angst(!)
> 
> It's the Abyss cutscene chapter. You know how this is an Everyone Lives AU? This chapter is the reason for the exception tag.

The Knight was alone in the dark, waiting.

It was quieter now, after it had been so deafeningly loud for so long, and for the time being all the cries were distant and weak. They ran their hands over the chitin of their arms over and over, for anything at all to feel that wasn’t hard, ungiving faces with wet eyes and heavy with dead weight. The still-soft substance their hands smoothed over was scored with shallow claw marks, from hands not their own grasping blindly in the dark.

The Knight didn’t know why they all were so afraid, when the Knight was only scared of them. Desperately, others had clawed and pushed and fallen until the Knight gave in and let them pass without qualm or defense. No claws of their own had stopped the constant struggle of bodies going _up_ , and the Knight heard from above the screaming calls of the hurt, silent but indelible, pleading and fading and having the cry picked up by another, and then another.

It was all the Knight could do, to sit quietly while the seeping void and still masks piled overtop each other, and wait for it to stop.

They had waited a long, long time.

But now it was quiet, and the Knight wanted to _see_. There was more above, there was something to be known higher up, and maybe it would be better. The Knight knew it would be better.

So they unfurled stiff, uncoordinated limbs and slowly, slowly pushed their way up and past others that had gone limp and dripped slowly back down.

When they broke the surface, they nearly didn’t realize. Void was so thick on the air that they could hardly see any further than before. But then the first sibling met the carpeting bodies below with a simple, resounding _crack_ of breaking bone, fallen so suddenly the Knight had hardly heard them cry. The Knight pushed themself to their feet, swaying and unsteady, and fled away into the dark, tripping over unknowable hard bone and softer, dissipating bodies.

If they went up, they would die. So they would wait.

There were only a handful of siblings crawling free of the pile, dwindling as the Knight watched and watched. Most immediately launched themselves to the climb, shaking, new hands grasping at outcroppings of sharp stone and brushing past the earlier aspirants, and shortly thereafter taking their places among them. The Knight wished they wouldn’t. The Knight watched sibling after sibling try and fall as they sat unmoving far from the ascent, perched on a small outcropping in the stone so as not to touch any masks.

They wished their siblings would only wait a while, to not heed the commanding voice they heard ask them to _climb_ , and ignore the gleaming, promising light at the very top. Only long enough to not feel so alone.

And then, one did. Their horns arched proud over their mask, and they walked so deliberately that the Knight thought they would mount the first step without hesitation. But instead they only looked up, alone for the moment beneath the stone path that led dizzyingly upwards, and then around. They turned their pale face toward the Knight.

Calmly, implacably, they came closer, picking their way with care over the uneven floor, sticky black in places, until they were looking up at the Knight crouched on their little bastion of stone.

They tilted their head in question, looking back to the light above and then at the Knight once more.

The Knight only stared down at them in wonder, something like the opposite of loneliness plucking at their chest, and offered their hand to help them up.

The sibling considered it gravely, and the Knight gave a silent, unpracticed laugh that made the sibling look up, the set of their shoulders somehow softer. They accepted the Knight’s hand, and the Knight hauled them up to collapse, still weak from their own escape from below, beside them on the cold stone.

They lay flat on their back, apparently more tired than they’d let on, and shifted their head to look at the Knight still. The Knight was, of course, watching them intently, which seemed to make them embarrassed as they rolled themself stiffly into a sitting position, crossing their legs.

The Knight mirrored them and, ever so gently, reached out to touch their mask, to make certain they, at least, were alive. They watched, disbelieving and incredulously hopeful regardless, as their stoic sibling accepted the touch for a moment, before taking the Knight’s hand in theirs to examine the way their claws lay, and carefully manipulate the joints of their fingers.

The Knight expected it to hurt, but it was only the curious press of another’s hand on theirs. The sibling was just as cold as they, exactly of the same temperature. They wondered if they had the same horns, too. To find out, they took their hand back and used it to painstakingly map out one of their own horns, taking studious note of the width and height and the dullness of the points, and then ran their hands over one of their sibling’s.

The sibling bore this with grace, even bowing their head some to make the process easier.

Hello, they said finally. You don’t want to go?

The Knight almost missed the quiet whisper of their void-speak, just a faint thought among thoughts and accustomed to shrieks and wails, but they responded in kind, using their own voice at last.

No, no one who goes up stays there. I will stay here, I think. I will wait until it is quiet.

Oh, the sibling replied. Their horns, the Knight found, were sharper than the Knight’s own.

And then what?

The Knight hadn’t thought about that, and took their hands back to fiddle with their own claws. I think, the Knight said slowly, I think I will climb too, then.

The sibling seemed distressed at that, though the only way the Knight could tell was through the disquiet resonating through their void. But won’t you also fall? The sibling asked, and ‘fall’ felt more like ‘die.’

I’ll climb somewhere else, the Knight proclaimed. I’ll go somewhere new. I’ll see something that isn’t light, and I won’t fall.

You will, the sibling insisted. Nowhere else to go.

There is somewhere else, the Knight insisted. I waited here, and now you’re here, too. We don’t need to go up. Why not look elsewhere?

The sibling thought about this for a long moment. Can I come with you? They finally asked.

The Knight’s void sang all at once, a pure, delighted note amongst discord, and they seized the sibling’s mask in both hands and, in their excitement, crashed their own against it painfully where they’d intended to tap their foreheads together. They laughed again, happy and light, as the sibling recoiled in shock.

We’ll find the way out together! The Knight exclaimed as the sibling rubbed at their mask.

We’ll look for a way out together, the sibling tempered.

And so they did. The Abyss was a vast place, for all that the ancient smooth carapaces that made up the wide, slowly inward-curving walls, gargantuan to the little Vessels and seemingly endlessly stacked, had no purchase for their claws. Where there wasn’t convex, pristine stone, too hard to chip handholds into, there were wicked thorns of crystal, pale and each ending in a bitter point.

First they’d rounded the limits of the darkness, checking between every huge, rounded stone for a gap. There had been a few so far, and even one or two that they could squeeze into, but none that led anywhere deeper than a few arm-lengths into the solid earth.

It was in one of these, on their third or fourth circuit, that they met another sibling.

They had more horns than the Knight or the Sibling, as the Knight had dubbed them for their own clarity, but the new sibling’s horns were much smaller and jutted in two pairs from the sides of their mask, where the tips curved daintily upward. The Knight was ecstatic to find another hadn’t succumbed to the soft, demanding voice above, still calling unrelentingly down to them. The Knight greeted them with a tight hug and a cheerful call, which the new sibling received quietly.

Do you know what’s above us? They asked the Knight and the Sibling both when they were released.

Light and a promise, the Knight replied.

Death, the stoic Sibling supported.

You’re both wrong, the quiet sibling said, sitting perched against the dusty wall. There are these.

And the sibling drew something from where it rested on their back, something sharp as a thorn and straight as one, too, but dull and corroded and scarred. Nails, the sibling told them. For protection.

Have you found a way out? The Sibling asked, and the Knight knew the searching had begun to wear on them, because their silent voice was harsher than it had ever been when they’d spoken to the Knight.

No, the armed sibling replied, replacing the weapon where it hung ready at their back. Not yet. Found this at the shore of the sea.

The sea? The Sibling demanded.

It offered me peace, the quiet sibling murmured. But I don’t want peace. I want to see who makes nails. I want to know why they make them. I want to use them so no one’s claws cut me again, and no light can hurt me. You shouldn’t go to the sea. You look like you want peace.

The Knight understood, hand brushing idly along their arm where the scores of claw marks had already faded, filled in by the slow draw from the void floating all around. Beside them, the Sibling took notice and reached out and took their hand in theirs, so careful of their claws that if the Knight hadn’t known they had them, they’d have assumed the Sibling’s hand was only made of comforting, solid shadow and gentle touch.

Do you want to come with us, and search? The Knight offered. The hand in theirs tightened reflexively for a moment, but it was so fast the Knight couldn’t be sure it had happened at all, or that it wasn’t their own movement at that.

No, the quiet sibling said. I don’t want anyone to talk to for a while. I want to be alone, and there is no alone here. But, would you tell me your names, so that I might recognize you if we meet outside?

They said ‘outside’ like it was a dream, or else somewhere lofty and unattainable, but not without expectation. If ever there was a way out that wasn’t through the light, the quiet sibling would find it.

I am a Knight, the Knight said.

What does that mean? Asked the quiet sibling.

It means I am loyal, and brave, and I will never lose hope, the Knight replied.

How do you know? The sibling asked again.

Don’t you know some things, ideas that you don’t understand but that make you feel? The Knight countered, struggling for words. Things that don’t exist here, except in you?

No, the quiet sibling whispered. Not yet, I don’t think.

The Sibling was solemn at the Knight’s side. I have no name, they said, and I think that I shouldn’t. It would be wrong. That is what exists in me. Aside from that understanding, I must be hollow.

The Knight thought that was a strange thing to say, for they knew the Sibling was anything but. But they said it with such force, such desperate intensity that the Knight couldn’t find the words to argue and only squeezed their hand tighter.

The quiet sibling only nodded and turned away without offering their own name, and the Knight took that as an indication to leave and return to their search.

As before, they followed the wall around. In time, as they walked and searched and searched, the bodies piled up beneath them. The Knight began to notice that familiar landmarks, once enough time had passed to notice each a thousand times over, began to appear smaller, every pass layering another mask around it until some became buried entirely.

Thousands and thousands of siblings. The Knight chose to ignore the rising tide and instead spoke incessantly to the Sibling, who listened to their every word and wish and wonder with rapt attention. Sometimes, if they were particularly taken with something the Knight said, the Sibling would offer their own thoughts.

Do you think music is nice? The Sibling asked.

In the intervening months, or weeks, or years, they’d spoken to perhaps a dozen other siblings scattered across the Abyss. Some hadn’t tried the climb, like the Knight and the Sibling, but others had tried and survived the fall. It was one of those who spoke of melodies, with void seeping like dense fog from a neat, round-edged hole punched in their mask by the crystal spike that had stopped their fall. They were hanging on by a thread, the rapid loss of void only partly countered by what they could reabsorb, and the Knight and the Sibling had stayed with them while they cried wet black tears and talked about something they’d heard, like voices without void, sweet and warm.

There’s something above, the dying sibling had sobbed. There’s something he won’t let us see, something that I want to hear forever, but I only wanted to leave.

The Knight was terrified by the experience, something about it bridging the gap between the ever-silent dead that covered the floor and had since they’d hatched, and the living Sibling gripping their hand as they both waited for their fallen kin to fade.

The memory made them reach out and link their hands together again, something they’d done with increasing regularity as time crawled on and no escape presented itself, save the obvious. It pushed back the numbing, quiet fear of the inevitable, should they find no way out, just a little.

I think it is, the Knight answered anyway. What do you think it sounds like? They asked.

The Sibling considered carefully for a long time, but not more than a day, or an hour. The Knight waited patiently.

I think it’s like this, the Sibling said at last, and conveyed a deep resonating vibration to them that lifted and fell and mimicked the hum of anxious void.

That’s just a sound, the Knight argued.

Sound is what music is, isn’t it? The Sibling rebutted.

Music is supposed to sound sweet, the Knight returned. That just sounds uncomfortable.

That made the Sibling pause to think. You try, they encouraged.

The Knight didn’t have a good answer to that except to compose their own idea, so they cast around for all their favorite sounds. These ended up all being void-speak, for the Knight couldn’t remember any sort of welcoming noise occurring outside of it in the Abyss, which worked well for that void-speak was how they could convey it.

What the Knight eventually landed on was a recital of laughter of siblings, moments and hums of the Sibling’s fond voice, and the general impression of happy conversation.

Oh, the Sibling said. That is nice. But I don’t think that’s music either.

The Knight themself was fairly sure it wasn’t, and shrugged and swung their joined hands back and forth. We will have time to find music, once we’re somewhere else, the Knight reassured.

The Sibling bobbled their head in quiet, acknowledging amusement, and the Knight giggled at them.

Another time one of the fallen siblings, a more fortunate one with only a badly broken arm that would heal by itself in time to show for it instead of a shattered mask, told them what had caused them to fall.

It’s a test, they told the attentively listening Knight and Sibling. And I failed. They want emptiness from us, but I was too afraid. One before me was too bold. The one before them loved.

And all of these things, the broken-armed sibling said decisively, are flaws. When I heal, I will try again, and I won’t be afraid. He’s so bright, and wonderful to see. I don’t want to be in the dark anymore.

The interaction gave the Knight a deep-set sense of disquiet, and made the Sibling go very still and thoughtful for a time in a way that frightened the Knight, though they couldn’t imagine why. The Sibling would never abandon them, or leave to face down the light alone.

But soon they perked up again and began to talk once more, and the Knight forgot they’d ever been distant.

And so time passed, and the floor grew higher, and eventually the Sibling noticed that a way that had previously been simply too high to consider, a fairly large break in the wall that had been far over their heads, had come only just close enough to climb to.

Here, the Sibling said with barely contained excitement, climb over me to reach.

The Knight clambered onto their back and then, at the Sibling's urging, to stand atop their head. They gripped one of the Sibling's tall horns for balance as they stood up, and then reached as high as they could over the swell of a smooth boulder. They scraped their claws over its surface and, to their delight, found a claw-hold just deep enough to haul themself over the top. There they reached back down for the Sibling, who leapt to grab their hand, and pulled them over as well.

What lay past didn’t look like much, but after years of the same darkness and nagging awareness of the narrow, steep climb that led to the ever-glowing light, it was so exciting that the Knight seized the Sibling’s hands and jumped joyously in place a few times before pulling them along behind, eager to explore.

The Sibling, no less eager, was nevertheless slightly more cautious, and tugged at them to slow down. The Knight was loathe to listen, especially as they noticed that once they’d taken a few steps the ever-present layer of masks thinned and then gave way to open, flat stone, but they reined themself in to pad alongside them, marveling at the solid surface beneath and the new sounds their claws made, tapping against the rock.

The Sibling was not quite as distracted, scanning the way ahead with an intensity they rarely possessed. They were the one to spot the structure first.

Look, the Sibling said to them, and pointed to something in the distance.

The Knight glanced up and saw something towering there, grey and shrouded in dark and pale in spite of it.

What is it? They asked the Sibling, who shrugged.

Not dangerous, probably, was all the Sibling said, which the Knight took as a good sign.

They made their way closer and as the something emerged from the gloom, it became a building, tall and spiraling and lined with carved, repeating symbols and swirls of cast metal.

Let’s climb it, and look out from the top! The Knight exclaimed, tugging at the Sibling’s hand.

The Sibling mumbled their acceptance, and the Knight resolutely walked as quickly as they could until they stood at the tower’s base. It loomed far above, like a dismal promise, its reaching heights too dark to see.

The Knight immediately began to climb the winding stairs set into its side, though they had to let go of the Sibling’s hand, the steps too narrow for even two as small as they. They ascended quickly, clambering up step after step and listening for the Sibling behind them doing the same, their claws scraping over the pale stone.

At the top they crawled onto a landing, clicking metallically under the Knight’s claws and leading into a little space at the very top. Within, there was a massive glass ball, braced by metal claws where it met the ceiling and floor, and a dead bug clad in white.

The Knight examined the corpse curiously as the Sibling glanced over the mechanism, looking between a lever conspicuously close by and back again, and in a sudden movement pushing at it until it snapped into place.

There was a fast rush of thousands of tiny wings, and the huge empty glass was suddenly filled with the smallest creatures the Knight had ever seen, rushing up into the bulb to fill it with their glow. Each might have only been a pinprick of light, brilliant against the darkness, but together the glow was overwhelming.

It was a cold glow, and unwelcoming, but it was so different from the endless dark that the Knight thought it incredible and beautiful, flooding out and bathing them in light. They looked with delighted astonishment over at the Sibling and found them washed out and illuminated by it, the light flooding every hidden detail until they were well-lit for the first time in their lives.

The Sibling’s mask was luminescent pale where it wasn’t smudged with dust or flaking black, their eyes contrasted at last by their colorless face, and they had their hands clenched tightly. The Knight realized the Sibling was furious, and scared.

The Sibling was frozen a moment longer, and then they lunged forward and pulled the lever back the other way. One by one, the little flies descended with lazy flutters of their wings back below, settling out of sight and taking their light with them.

Of course, the light is here, too, the Sibling mumbled vehemently.

The Knight understood, and though they cast the unlit glass a longing glance as they followed the Sibling out, they made no move to reignite it.

Outside, their hopes of looking around from a higher vantage point were stymied by that the void was too thick in the air to see through very far. It was an isolating effect, being unable to see the walls or ceiling above through the darkness all around, like they were the only ones left, stranded where no one would follow.

The Sibling didn’t linger long once they realized it was no use, climbing back down without pause. Once down, they only kept walking, once they’d cast a backward glance to ensure the Knight was following close enough behind.

And just as the sibling with the nail had said, they soon came within sight of a vast, dark expanse whose surface writhed and glistened with a thousand thrashing, squirming blades, with edges so fine that even from this distance the Knight’s body stung with remembered gashes. It looked endless, tumultuous and dark, and it brimmed with whispers and countless, layered voices calling and sighing and, most damning of all, present but stilled, the weight of words on the air that hung soundless even through the void.

There were songs here, but they hung still like shrouds. Songs of the Void were not songs at all.

The sibling with the nail had been right, the Knight thought dully. It felt terribly like a kind of peace. Quiet, senseless, expectant, it beckoned them like it had been waiting for their arrival, the fluid void drawn to their own.

The moment the Sibling noticed its pull and recognized it for what it was and the offer it presented, they grabbed the Knight’s hand, shaking the Knight out of the calm that had fallen over then, and bolted away at a dead run. They sprinted together back past the looming structure with its glaring, killed light, and then slid back down into the pit of the Abyss, their feet landing again in the rattle of bones, and continued to run. The Sibling was fast and enduring, almost dancing over the masks with grace that had never been the Knight’s. The Knight stumbled and clattered after them, falling more than once and jarring themself on the hard masks below, but didn’t complain.

The quiet, guarded sibling had been right, the Knight thought again. The Knight did want peace, so badly that when it was offered, they’d have stepped into the lashing void if not for the Sibling bodily hauling them away at breakneck speed, as fast as they could manage and faster.

They ran until the Knight tripped and couldn’t move any further, trembling with effort and confusion as their limbs refused to listen to them. The Sibling was stopped short by the dead weight they held onto, and though they too trembled, the Knight felt that they were more scared than exhausted.

But then they looked past the Knight, searching keenly into the dark and listening for something with razor-focus. After tense minutes of stiff silence where the Knight thought they might be forced up to run again, the Sibling allowed themself to collapse to their knees alongside them. They whispered apologies when they finally released the Knight’s hand, aching and sore, and allowed the Knight to lean on them to scoot themself upright.

Please don’t go back, the Sibling begged among their hushed, regretful hovering. Never go back.

I won’t, the Knight soothed and pulled them into a tight hug. But I don’t need to fear it, do I? I’ll always have you to keep me away.

The Sibling began to quake in their arms and something damp fell to the Knight’s shoulder. They tried to move away enough to see what, but the Sibling tremulously dragged them close and curled a protective hand around the back of the Knight’s mask.

I’ll take you somewhere else, the Sibling said, their voice uneven and buzzing with a strange kind of grief that the Knight couldn’t place, for all that they’d heard so much sorrow. Somewhere safe, without light or dark, they vowed. We’ll both go and I’ll keep you safe even there.

Of course we’ll both go, the Knight said, surprised. Once we find our way out, we’ll go anywhere you like. The Knight nuzzled the side of their mask into the Sibling’s reassuringly, the soft scrape of living bone in the dense silence calming to them both.

Anywhere I like, the Sibling murmured. They laughed, so very quietly that the Knight stilled to make sure they’d heard it right. The Sibling had never laughed before.

The Sibling nuzzled back, relaxing by inches. Okay, they agreed like they didn’t quite believe it, surprised by their own acquiescence. And then wherever you’ll go, curious wanderer-Knight, they said.

They stayed like that for a time indeterminable in the murk and the watchful chill, resting against each other and taking heart that the other was still living and so safely close. Hours, or perhaps days, recovering from their panicked flight by slow absorption of the ambient void around. Then the Sibling urged them to their feet, and they took up the search again.

But the Sibling was quieter now.

They’d always been one to keep their thoughts largely to themself, and left most of the talking to the Knight, but the Knight felt that this was different. They were withdrawn, distant, and rarely indicated that they were so much as paying attention to where they walked. The Knight was sure that if treading over the shifting masks below hadn’t been second nature by now, the Sibling would have fallen more often than not. The Knight was worried, but nothing they said to the Sibling received more than a word or two in flat reply.

The only thing that reassured them was that the Sibling rarely let go of their hand, and even as they responded to little else they often brushed their thumb over the back of it when they sat to rest, the motion steady and constant like they were trying to engrave it into their memory.

Time went on, and the Sibling spoke less and less until they’d all but retreated entirely, their void distant and apart, theirs and the Knight’s joined hands the only point of contact. The Knight didn’t know what to think, but the loneliness was worse than the Abyss and they constantly, entreatingly tried to talk to them. The Sibling never responded, but never did they indicate they were growing frustrated, or annoyed, or anything at all.

And then it came to a head when they rounded back once again to the ascent, with the taunting light above even now, small in the distance. The Sibling stopped and stared up at it, still and calm as the grave.

I’m going to protect you, the Sibling said without warning, their voice cold and determined. And I’m going to get you out. No matter the cost.

And they dropped the Knight’s hand and jumped up the first step, so much more smoothly than those siblings who had tried and failed so often before.

The Knight’s heart shattered. For too long all they could do, as they watched the Sibling climb higher and higher, was stare in absolute incomprehension. It didn’t make sense, the Sibling would _never_ abandon them.

They wouldn’t, the Knight thought with mounting desperation reaching a fever-pitch, thrumming painful and choking in the base of their throat, they wouldn’t.

They would, and they were. The Sibling was nothing if not efficient, and already they were halfway up, the pale point of their moving mask growing smaller and then disappearing for a moment overtop a platform.

The sight jolted them out of their stupor. The Knight threw themself at the first ledge, their only thought like a flash of light in their mind, blazing over and over, that the Sibling was going to die. The Knight was going to have to watch them fall if they didn’t catch up.

But the Sibling had always been faster and stronger than them, and by the time the Knight was leaping for the next crumbling stone, they glanced up to see them already standing before that eternal light. The Knight tore at the stone to haul themself up it faster, kicking for any purchase to clamber up and then doing the same again, claws cracking in the strain of their grip and trailing black, when they heard the first words, clear and cold as frost, settle over their mind.

No cost too great.

It was an uncanny mirror of the Sibling’s last words to them that sunk its wrenching claws deep into their chest, made their limbs seize up with terror. The Knight climbed.

No mind to think.

One sibling, then another, then a third rained down around them, dropping like pale stones through the dense air, failing their own climbs, and the Knight couldn’t care, couldn’t look, not when they could still see the Sibling stark against the white.

No will to break.

They were close, the Knight was so close, they could take the Sibling’s hand and drag them away and back to safety and hug them close, and they would find another way, they _would_.

No voice to cry suffering.

The Knight couldn’t think anymore past the fast, frantic rush of their void, focusing only on the next jump, the climb, where to put their feet and which holds to sink their bleeding claws into, and looking up to make sure the Sibling hadn’t yet fallen.

Born of God and Void.

They wouldn’t, the Knight pleaded over and over again, they wouldn’t, they wouldn’t.

And then there was only the final gap, just a little too far to make. The Knight didn’t even notice and took a running leap with only a few stumbling steps, seeing the Sibling only just past it, turned away from them.

The Knight couldn’t jump far enough. They crashed bodily against the rigid metal of the landing, legs swinging with the momentum and only their broken claws, quickly latched onto spaces in the wrought iron, preventing them from falling. They kicked desperately, but the landing scooped sharply away from the fine-pointed edge, and there was nothing to catch with limb or claw.

The Knight wouldn’t be able to haul themself up, their arms already trembling with effort. After a moment, while the Sibling took measured careful steps into the light, _away_ , they could only hang there limply, winded and bruised and without giving a moment’s thought to the fatal fall below, for all they could see was the Sibling’s retreating steps.

The Knight screamed at them.

They’d never done so before, and if fifteen minutes prior one had asked them if they could, they might have guessed not.

The Knight could scream, and now they did so. A wordless, betrayed cry, dripping with agony and razor-edged with desperation. It was only the once, and the force of it tore at their void nearly as much as the way the Sibling stopped dead and turned to look at them.

There was careful nothing in their eyes. Their hands did not shake. Their legs were not unsteady. They said nothing in return, only stared at the Knight, bleeding and ready to bleed out in every drop if only they would stay, if only they wouldn’t follow the light and die, like all the others.

The Sibling did not stay. They looked down at the Knight a moment longer, and then they turned away and were gone.

The Knight could only bear witness as there was a great crumbling of stone, and their aching claws were torn loose from the iron as the light was cut off all at once, the force of something unimaginably heavy falling into place jolting through them and, though they weakly grasped for a hold, dislodging them like so much clinging mud to fall down into the black.

You shall seal the blinding light that plagues their dreams, the voice whispered, the final word ringing with such finality it was as a sentence to death.

You are the Vessel. You are the Hollow Knight, the voice breathed like the brush of winter air.

The words weren’t meant for the Knight, but they heard them anyway.

And Ghost woke up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And the rest is history.
> 
> And with that, we're just over halfway through. Don't think too harshly of Hollow, they really did see this as the only option. Ghost doesn't have /quite/ the monopoly on self-sacrifice. 
> 
> This is also maybe one of the angstiest chapters in the entire fic, so no, we definitely aren't taking a nosedive into Crushing Angst territory. Just a brief dip.


	18. To Know

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ghost has a lot to recover from, and much to think about, or not.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Angst, but less. Nothing else.

The ascent from the Abyss was much less difficult than they remembered. Barriers that they had struggled and labored to surmount back then, that had seemed so tall and hostile that had they not been entirely focused they might not have even tried, were trivial now.

Even that last leap, that made Ghost cold to look at still, was hardly more than a quick hop.

And then they were out of the opened door, which seemed wrong in that there was no light waiting behind it, and hadn’t been for a very long time, and Hornet was upon them.

“Did you find anything? What took you-“ Hornet stopped herself short, and in a moment was crouched before them. “Little Ghost, what’s wrong?” She demanded, already looking around them and bristling for a fight, and Ghost realized they were crying.

The hand they brushed beneath their eye came away wet, and still the tears fell, dripping down their face to land, one by one, with little muffled plicking noises on the floor. Ghost looked up into her worried face and realized also that they shook violently, tremors running in waves down their body, though that couldn’t have begun until they’d finished the climb.

“What happened?” Hornet’s voice was hushed now, careful.

They were gone, the Sibling, the Hollow Knight, for who else could they have cared for so enduringly that it would call them back from beyond the Wastes, where they’d forgotten all else? They were gone, but Hornet was still here, and that single light after everything was what made them barrel into her gracelessly and wrap their arms around her neck, heaving with silent sobs.

Hornet nearly lost her balance, but it seemed that by this time she was almost expecting this. She wrapped her arms tightly around them, enshrouding Ghost in her warm shawl, and said nothing but quiet, soothing noises murmured to them over and over, like she had only those few of them to give.

Each one cut into their chest, burned instead of soothed because while Ghost could hear them aloud, they were silent where Ghost kept expecting to hear them instead. Regardless, each was a reminder that they weren’t caught in the Abyss anymore, somewhere they never, never wanted to be again. Not ever, after they’d given so much to leave. No one had spoken in the Abyss save for the Pale King.

Her hugs were nothing like the Hollow Knight’s, and Ghost loved her all the more for it even while the loss dug into their chest, an already bleeding wound. Hornet was larger than them, more stretched out, and much warmer. She could tuck their mask under her chin if they angled their horns right, and there they could bury their face deeply into the dirty fabric of her neckguard and wail. To cry like that caught at their void like hooks, nearly as painful as it was cathartic.

They still couldn’t recall if they’d ever mourned the Sibling, and now they thought they might never have. Not understanding what they’d sacrificed.

I miss them, Ghost gasped, shuddering, and pressed their forehead into Hornet’s thin shoulder. They’re hurting and I _left_ them here. I left them here for so _long_.

Ghost wept and apologized over and over, but Hornet only kept up her steady stream of repeating reassurances, infinitely louder than their voice and still soft and low, letting them cry without complaint.

She couldn’t hear it. Hornet had never been able to hear them void-speak, but maybe one day they could talk in other ways.

Ghost cried for a long time, until the exhaustion and shock caught up to them and they could only lie limp in her arms, half-asleep and occasionally hiccupping with distress, as she picked them up and carried them off. Lulled by the even tempo of her stride and the warmth of her embrace, shocking and precious after so long in the Abyss’ eternal chill, they drifted in and out of awareness as she carried them somewhere. They knew it would be somewhere safe, and anywhere, anywhere at all, was preferable to Ghost to that looming, open door that dropped into the dark.

If they ever had to go back, it would be far too soon. Ghost thought they might recognize some of the masks, now.

As it turned out, the safe place Hornet carted them off to was the stag station, though they only recognized it by the distant rumble of the Stag’s voice, which surely couldn’t have been so hushed as it seemed. It wasn’t a surprise, though the memory of the conversation felt like it had taken place weeks ago instead of… However long they’d been down there.

It felt like years. But that was impossible, or else Hornet would have been utterly fuming when they’d finally gotten out. Ghost rather expected she would have left long before that though, and found they couldn’t bring themself to truly consider even the hypothetical thought of Hornet abandoning them, even in such an extreme scenario. She wouldn’t, they told themself, and then, because the words only convinced them of the possibility that she might, there’s no reason for her to.

Ghost came to the gradual awareness that they were lying in Hornet’s lap, their face still hidden in her shawl and the red, dense fabric making the world blessedly dim, one of her hands idly stroking over the strands of their tattered cloak where they lay half-curled against her arm. Their claws were clenched so tightly in the red fabric that they ached in pulses, as though they hadn’t been relaxed in hours. Distantly, Ghost could hear the soft patter of rain.

They slowly released their grip, though that turned the ache to a sharp bite, shifting groggily in Hornet’s arms to look up at her face. Hornet was staring off to the side somewhere, with the rippling shadows of rain running down a window playing over her mask. When she felt them shift she looked down and blinked tiredly.

“Good, you’re awake.” She said, and her voice was a rough rasp, like it hadn’t been used in a while. “I was beginning to worry. Is it typical of your sort, to exhaust yourself and then sleep for a day and a night?” There was a hint of her usual forthrightness in her tone, washed quickly away by the soothing hand that didn’t stop petting over their cloak. Ghost noticed she was shivering, ever so slightly, a tremor in the hand they weren’t weighing down.

How long had they been unaware, that they could have chilled her like that?

Ghost shook their head, and sat up. It hurt. They ached all over, and they were starving. Ghost hadn’t a drop of soul left to heal with, nor the excess void to do it for them, so they resigned themself to the nagging pain for the time being and leaned heavily against Hornet’s shoulder.

Hornet looked back to the window and draped her free arm over the back of the plush chair she sat in, and Ghost looked blearily around. They were in the City of Tears, that much was obvious, though how they’d gotten there was something of a mystery. The only thing Ghost could imagine was that they somehow hadn’t noticed Hornet carry them onto or off of the Stag’s back, nor even the doubtless uneven ride between.

“You were down there a long time, Ghost. Three days, maybe four.” Hornet began, still staring resolutely away with a peculiar look twisting her face, lifeless in her eyes.

Regret, Ghost realized belatedly, or guilt.

Hornet took in a bracing breath, and it came out as a sigh. “I’m so sorry.” She whispered, so quietly that Ghost had to strain to hear.

“If I’d known what it would do to you, I’d never have asked you to journey to that cursed place, especially without knowing if any good would come of it. But that is no excuse. You met with something terrible down there, didn’t you?” She didn’t say it like a question, but as little more than a confirmation of culpability.

Ghost could do nothing but nod, and Hornet nodded back shallowly without turning to face them.

“I won’t be so callous as to ask if the trip was worth anything. I only hope that, for your sake, it wasn’t entirely wasted.”

Ghost leaned into her and squeezed her into a tight hug that hurt their own shoulders and made Hornet exhale roughly. They didn’t like how dull her voice was, like she was waiting for them to condemn her. They wouldn’t. There was no way she could have known, not when even they hadn’t.

And they didn’t think it had been a wasted effort. If nothing else they were grateful to remember the Hollow Knight, however savagely it hurt to. It was like the memory had been slotted back into their existence, as though it had never left, fundamental and essential. The Hollow Knight didn’t deserve to be forgotten, not by the only other who would remember what they’d done. Ghost had so little left to remember, but now they had years returned to them. It had to have been years. Decades.

The rain fell outside, and Ghost hurt in every ounce of void they had, and they were more exhausted than they thought they’d ever been, and what the Sibling had done had shattered them twice over; once for the betrayal, betrayal they now understood had hardly been betrayal at all, and again for their own guilt, knowing now what had awaited them for their choice.

But that didn’t matter. Ghost had come to Hallownest for a purpose, and now more than ever they knew what it was and that they’d accomplish it. They’d told the Sibling countless times that they’d escape and that they’d do it together, and now they’d make good on their word.

And again, something was changed.

They’d thought it just because of their proximity to the Void Sea, but Ghost was still aware of the void that lay beneath Hallownest in a way they hadn’t been before. It felt closer, like they could reach out and touch it if they so desired. It felt deep, bottomless even, and fortunately placid. The Void wasn’t trying to draw them in anymore; it already had them, and yet Ghost was still alive.

So Ghost nodded, drying their face against Hornet’s shawl, which they saw was dappled and stained with an alarmingly extensive splotch of black.

Had they cried so much? Ghost supposed they had to have.

Hornet looked down at them with disbelief. “What, is that all? Aren’t you angry?”

Ghost shook their head. They weren’t, not remotely. Only… Empty, perhaps. Tired. Resolute.

They didn’t think they had the capacity for anger right now, even if they had thought Hornet was deserving of it. Ghost was only fervently, deeply glad she was there. They didn’t think they could have handled facing the aftermath alone, not the least because they’d apparently been nigh-comatose for a day or more.

They didn’t want to be alone at all for a while.

Not until the memory of the emptiness of the Sibling’s eyes lost some of its bite.

They shivered once, and curled closer still into Hornet’s warmth, almost stinging after the deep chill of void. The sibling they hadn’t lost, and if they had their way, never would.

Hornet hissed out a breath. “If before you were cold, now you’re like ice. I can hardly feel my hands.”

Ghost’s void jolted with alarm, the depths of the Void Sea called to mind, with its numbing, endlessly collected void, and shoved themself away from her against the protests of their throbbing arms. They misjudged the force and nearly went toppling backwards off the chair, and would have if Hornet had slower reflexes. She caught them just as their center of balance shifted in favor of gravity, dangling them in midair from where she held them at arm’s length.

“I was joking,” Hornet said flatly, exhaustion Ghost hadn’t picked up on before grating at her voice. “And badly, at that. I’m sure it’s because I’ve been carting you around for a few days, and not because of whatever you’re scared of.”

“Unless that was the straw that broke the stag’s back, and now you will truly hold my failures against me?” Hornet said mock-hopefully, undercut with something raw and honest.

Ghost shook their head, too drained themself to object to how she held them aloft from under their arms like a grub.

I don’t, they said, though they knew she wouldn’t hear. I won’t.

Instead of expecting a reply, Ghost strained their shoulders to reach out and pat her mask delicately between the eyes, the only part of her they could reach at all.

Hornet snorted a disbelieving laugh and pulled them close for an airless, crushing hug, the only kind it seemed she knew how to give.

“I’m not practiced with reassurance, but I hope you know that I will offer it. I am only grateful you have no hatred for me, though I’ve earned it over and over again.” She said and gave them a final unforgiving squeeze that hurt Ghost’s aching carapace far more than she must have intended, but that they wouldn’t have traded for anything.

Then Hornet set them aside on the chair next to her and stood up. Her joints crackled disconcertingly, but she gave no indication of discomfort past rolling her shoulders beneath her shawl and surreptitiously shaking out her hands.

“We leave for the first Dreamer when we have recovered sufficiently. Do you need anything?” Hornet asked, all business in an instant.

Ghost, rubbing at the disturbed, painful void in their shoulders, looked up. Yes, actually, they needed a fair amount of soul to replenish what they’d spent, and a fair amount more than that to heal all the little mounting pains spread across their body. Ghost thought of a way to communicate this with their limited written vocabulary, and then realized that might not be necessary at all.

They withdrew a page of map-paper, stained faintly grey now, and their trustworthy pen and ink and scribbled down their best approximation of the sign they wanted.

“Is that… You? No, no, that’s a hot spring, isn’t it? That place must have done a number on you. Well, you’re in luck.” Hornet told them, already striding towards the door.

Ghost jumped up, to their void’s protests, and followed quickly, carefully focusing on the now instead of all the dark and shadowed memory circling their mind. It seemed Hornet was content to do the same, no trace of her moment of doubt evident in her confident stride or her tone.

“You’re very fortunate that your Stag recalled the way to King’s Station. He tells me that he hasn’t the memory to make it many other places, it seems. He is, in turn, rather fortunate that he’s the last stag I am aware of, or he may well have been removed from duty as well as such a thing might be accomplished nowadays. A stag that cannot easily recall the stagways is a danger, particularly to those who they would carry.” Hornet said judgmentally as she let them down a plush hall and up a steep stair.

Ghost thought that was slightly unfair, but Hornet often judged others as harshly as she judged herself, and they thought they’d save their defense for when they could properly relay it to her. Of course in her eyes a bug who could not perform their duty would be an affront to her own.

“But, I suppose in a pinch he is a decent hand at it. Certainly, he’s dedicated enough. And I cannot judge him too harshly, for even with how long ago my last ride on the stagways was I recall those trips as having significantly more jostling involved. Perhaps he was especially careful so that he wouldn’t wake you.” Hornet continued as she led them down a darkened corridor, decorated and clean but clearly unused for a long time, with the curtains drawn over every window.

Ghost would have to remember to thank the old Stag, though they were also fairly sure they wouldn’t have noticed in the slightest if the ride had been bumpy beyond measure.

As Hornet lapsed into quiet, apparently having said her piece, the drum of the rain outside and the close, stuffy air of the tower they climbed, insulated from the chill and the wet, began to lull Ghost into a doze. They’d never remembered how wonderful the absence of that particular cold was, the feeling of moving, living air, and simple things they’d taken for granted, like color. Like song.

Ghost thought of the Hollow Knight, caught in the Black Egg. Ghost had nearly forgotten the prickling glow of warmth and the beauty of the world, how colorful and varied it all was, by only remembering the years they’d spent at the bottom of the Abyss. Had it been long enough, sealed and caged, for the Hollow Knight to forget those things, too?

Ghost would show them, if it had. Everything beautiful in Hallownest, Ghost would find it all and show the Hollow Knight. They were so close, after all, with everything they needed to remove the seals and the inkling of a shred of a plan, a faraway hope that might well prove impossible but tantalized them nonetheless, for removing the Light within them. It was only a thought, more of a surge of intuition than a plan, but Ghost would be lying to say they weren’t curious if it would work.

If it did, everything would be right.

Caught up in their wistful, slightly disoriented daydream, Ghost walked into Hornet and sent her stumbling when she stopped at the top of the stairs. She righted herself immediately and turned to fix them with a withering glare that itself withered and died into rueful annoyance when she caught sight of them, even that more for the form of it than anything else, Ghost suspected.

Hornet didn’t comment as they swayed a little on their feet, every drop of their weary void aggravated by the climb, only quickly turned away and led them at a brisk pace down a narrow hall, more sporadically decorated than most of the City in this quarter, and then through a door, remarkable to Ghost in that it was only inlaid with the sparsest curl of iron around the hinge.

Inside was a steam-clouded room, strung with stalactites and not especially tall, but longer than they’d expected. The floor beneath their claws, polished to mirror-finish and slick with condensation, rolled up into an appealingly decorated pillar or two, more for show than any real architectural support. And to their relief, fed by those strange mask-shaped formations, in the middle of the room was a wide, shallow pool of hot spring water.

“I’ve taken you through the servants’ corridors, so be sure to remember where this door is. It’s designed to be hidden from the outside. I’d have brought you through the Pleasure House proper, but there are memories there I’d not like to disturb.” Hornet said gravely as she closed it behind them.

Ghost nodded distractedly into the curling steam, already rejuvenated some by even the thin misting of soul latent in the air by proximity to the springwater, and stumbled across the slippery floor to splash, nail, cloak, and all into the pool. The effect was immediate, their wounds and stretched-thin, faded void drinking in the soul and using it to renew their weakened carapace so quickly that the dull, mounting pain was reduced to a murmur in an instant. Ghost sat down in the milky water and ducked their mask beneath the surface, relaxing as the influx of energy took away the headache they hadn’t even noticed past everything else.

“I take it you like the springs?” Hornet said with amusement above them.

Revitalized, Ghost bounced into deeper water, taking delight in the resistance it presented, and splashed as much at her as they could with only their hands.

Hornet made an affronted noise at being sprayed, having just sat herself carefully down at the polished edge, and kicked some back in retaliation.

Ghost felt like they’d never be tired again, practically humming with energy, and splashed back over to her to tug at her hand.

“You know, this spring was once a highly sought after and very closely regulated resource.” Hornet informed them, her voice lilting with reluctant amusement as Ghost jumped up and down, making waves for the simple pleasure of it that crashed and overflowed the pool’s neat edges. “There were strict codes of conduct, and I believe you to be breaking every one.”

Ghost gave her a stronger pull and this time she went willingly, wading into the water and immediately soaking the hem of her shawl. As an afterthought, she freed her needle from her back and with the ease of long practice tossed it to the water’s edge, where it clattered to the tile. Then she turned to Ghost with a wicked gleam in her eye.

“You will wish you’d never challenged me,” Hornet goaded.

Ghost thrilled and, in a single fast movement, skated their hand over the water’s surface to send a spray of warm water directly at her face, vengeance for the time she’d splattered them with rainwater in much the same way.

Surprised, Hornet jerked back and shook her head vigorously, bubbling over with laughter almost before she’d cleared her eyes to see Ghost paddling gracelessly into deeper water.

Hornet gave a gleeful, vengeful trill, and Ghost had only a sense of foreboding before the wave she sent back swept them up and carried them to shallower water, where the battle began in earnest.

In the end it was fortuitous that Ghost didn’t breathe, because they spent more time underwater than above it. However much of an edge Ghost had over Hornet in hand-to-hand combat, she was unbeatable at splash fights, and had devastatingly accurate aim.

But they took heart that she was just as soaked as they were when they conceded defeat, as they sat at the poolside and Hornet tried in vain to squeeze some of the heavy water from her dripping shawl.

“At least it’s clean now, and I don’t have to trouble with scrubbing it. I think it’s only now that the last of that damned Wyrm’s ash has left the weave.” She remarked as she wrung out another handful over the pool.

She shook her head and huffed a soft laugh. “I can’t remember the last time I had… Fun. I suppose it’s only fair that I’m exhausted.” Hornet cut Ghost a rueful glance. “Not that you’re anything but ready to go, for whatever reason.”

Ghost, who had only called for a rest upon noticing Hornet starting to slow, shrugged smugly.

“Hmph, I’d thought as much. I suppose you want me to rest now, or something equally foolish?”

Ghost nodded, very aware of how tired she’d seemed when they’d woken up. If she’d slept at all recently, they’d be surprised, and if she hadn’t suggested it herself their next move would have been to drag her back to the comfortably plush chair they’d woken up on and stand guard until she’d slept at least a little while.

Hornet tilted her head in half-mock exasperation. “Fine, I suppose it’s been a few days. We will need all of our strength soon, anyway.”

Ghost tilted their head in question and Hornet hummed thoughtfully, eyes narrowed as though trying to recall something.

“As memory serves, the Watcher amassed a handful of lesser knights to guard his chambers as he slept. All of one tribe, I think, and as I can’t seem to recall which, it couldn’t have been a particularly skilled one. If we’re lucky, they’ll have all died by now. If we’re unlucky, they will be reanimated. If we are extremely unfortunate, they will still be alive, and we will have to pass them regardless.” Hornet explained, her typical sternness creeping back with that grim proclamation. She wrung another trickle of water from her shawl and pulled it back on with difficulty, rumpled and still damp.

“Whatever the case may be, I doubt they will be a match for you and I.” She said easily, and pushed herself to her feet with a wide yawn. “Anywhere in particular you’d prefer to be while I sleep for a few hours? I think I’ll just take a chair somewhere, but I’d like to know where to find you.”

Ghost didn’t feel especially keen on the notion of being alone, but the idea of seeing more of the City appealed. And what would be a neater combination of the two, Ghost thought, than a library?

They reached within their void, which Hornet didn’t so much as bat an eye at now, and brought out a couple of the engraved shells leftover from their first foray into the City. They displayed them to her with a tilt of their head, and Hornet, after a moment’s contemplation, hummed in acceptance.

“There should be a small archive just off of the next building over, if that’s what you’re after. You’ll probably be able to get some use from it on your own, now.”

At Ghost’s enthusiastic nod, she continued. “As far as I know, it’s the personal collection of some long-dead noble, so don’t be too disappointed by all the terrible poetry.” Hornet said as she collected her needle and strode away, Ghost quick to follow. “It’s denser than their thick skulls and takes an age and a half to get to any sort of point, which I swear they chose at random without the slightest actual relevance. Such was the style of the time, I think. I don’t have the patience for it, but I wish you luck.”

The little library she showed them to was on the small side, stuffed into a round-cornered room that seemed at odds with the stylistic leanings of much of the rest of the City of Tears, particularly for the grandeur it was enclosed by. There weren’t any windows, and only a low ceiling, so once Hornet shut the door and lit a flickering fire in the tiny fireplace the room quickly warmed up.

Hornet claimed a vast armchair, the only one in the room and likely the only one that would fit, and curled up until she was only a pile of red, still slightly damp shawl and white, curving horns, and almost immediately started to snore.

Ghost left her to sleep and browsed over the entirety of the library’s stock, top to bottom, before picking up a greyed tablet with interesting designs swirling in paint over the back side and sitting down with their back to Hornet’s armchair and their legs stretched towards the fire to read, just as they’d intended.

Still, they took a moment to stare mindlessly into the struggling flame, only just flickers more than embers in its grate. The warmth it gave off heated them through regardless, slowly but surely, and Ghost nearly wanted to just use the downtime to bask in it and take their own nap. Hornet had only just fallen asleep, and the fire wouldn’t last forever, and Ghost felt more than comfortable.

It felt, to them, like within this close little archive, quiet save the crackling of the fire and Hornet’s soft snuffling noises and the very, very distant patter of the rain, that everything was warm and the world very small. Outside was the harsh and the cold, and soon they’d have to take up the journey again, but for now there was nothing for Ghost to do but savor the gentle contentment, the sleepy desire that the moment go on forever.

It wouldn’t, though, and so instead Ghost turned their attention to the cramped script on their tablet and began to decipher it.

Hornet had been right. It was terribly dense, and Ghost wasn’t sure the inconsistencies that made it so hard to read were entirely their poor grasp of the written language or else just part of the writer’s style, intentionally or not. They quickly gave up on trying to make anything make sense, and focused instead on all the individual glyphs they could pick out.

It was easier to read than to write, Ghost found, especially when so many glyphs looked like ones from other kingdoms. If they’d been asked which kingdom, exactly, they couldn’t have said, but this set of dots and a curl read like the word for ‘songs,’ and that dip and jagged line when next to another reminded them of ‘spring,’ and the next of ‘wistful’ or ‘wanting’. And so it went, and Ghost found it was more entertaining to use what they could piece together to weave their own narrative like a string of notes to a melody, more image than sound.

Ghost couldn’t think of any songs to match, which dampened the mood some, but they weren’t one for regret, not for things they couldn’t change. They couldn’t regret journeying to Hallownest, and so they refused to regret what they’d lost for it.

The loss still ached, though. Perhaps Hornet could teach them a song or two, to sing to the Hollow Knight. Or maybe Myla knew a handful.

Did the Hollow Knight ever find out what music was? Ghost hoped they had.

Behind them Hornet gave a markedly irritated whine and scrunched herself into a tighter ball, and Ghost looked up to see that the fire had gone out long ago, dim in the grate and only smoking gently from a handful of smoldering sparks.

They set aside their tablet, then reconsidered and tucked it away with all the other treasures they’d picked up, and got to their feet to pad soundlessly across the soft floor. The door only squeaked a little when they opened it, but they stopped and cast a searching glance back at Hornet.

She hadn’t so much as twitched, the rise and fall of her side slow and regular, her face tucked neatly into the corner of the cushions. Ghost watched her for a minute to make sure she wouldn’t jump up and demand to know what they thought they were doing, and when she only snuffled peaceably on, they stepped outside and painstakingly closed the door behind them.

Ghost was only going out to rip down a curtain somewhere to feed the fire, but the walls hadn’t seemed thick enough to completely buffer the sound of someone violently wrenching one free of its rung, so they walked out through the adjoining building until they thought themself far enough away and picked a dense swathe of dusty fabric at random as their victim.

They nearly had it down when someone exclaimed in aggravation behind them.

“Just what do you think you’re doing? Destroying something like that, and for what? What in the world could you possibly want a curtain for?”

Ghost nearly jumped out of their carapace, dropped the mostly-displaced fabric, and whipped around with nail in hand in nearly one practiced motion.

The bug at the end of their blade didn’t look very repentant. If anything he scowled harder, long beard brushing the floor as he shook his head disdainfully. He was carrying something in a patched brown bag under one arm, and in the other held a thin waterproofed binder, open to display pages of disorganized charcoal-rubbings of, from the topmost page, etched writings.

“As I thought. Just a scavenger, with no respect for the history this ruin has to offer. Contemptible.” He said with venom.

Ghost thought that was a bold statement from an unarmed bug, but the charcoal pages caught their eye. They lowered their nail and padded closer for a better look.

The bug backed away and lifted the binder higher than Ghost could reach. “What designs do you have on my research? I’m not a scholar, and I’m not in the business of educating grubs. Scamper off back to whatever hole you crawled out of and leave me be.”

Ghost did not do that, and instead simply looked blankly up at him.

The bug squinted suspiciously. “Are going to leave?”

Ghost shook their head apologetically, too curious to let it lie, but put away their nail as a gesture of goodwill.

He gave an extremely put-upon sigh. “Ah, well. You adventurous sorts never know when you’re not wanted. And I guess you won’t be having anything to say, you quiet little speck?” He asked.

Ghost shrugged, and waited for him to put his ‘research’ down so they could see.

“Well, if you won’t leave, then I will.” The bug said abruptly.

“I’ve got work to do, and it doesn’t have to be done here. Now, I’m not telling you this because I appreciate you in any way, but my name is Lemm. I’m the relic seeker across the road. Look me up in my shop if you have anything interesting to give me, and I’ll pay you.” Lemm informed them in such a no-nonsense, annoyed way that Ghost almost thought they were being insulted until they parsed his words. It was almost formulaic, like he’d had the whole speech prepared and practiced down pat, and more polite than Ghost was rapidly growing to suspect Lemm usually was.

“That is, if you manage to hold on to any relics you don’t immediately destroy.”

And there was the insult.

Was he always like this, Ghost wondered as he snapped his binder shut, cinched it closed fastidiously, and made good on his word, leaving at his own pace and not without a resentful glare and an inaudible grumble. Or was he just extremely prickly about destruction of property, or ‘adventurous types,’ or both? All were equally strange to be up in arms about in Hallownest, of all places.

Ghost watched him go with a twinge of disappointment, assuaged in part that they now knew where he lived. A relic seeker, then. Ghost wasn’t sure how exactly one went about that, considering all of Hallownest was probably approaching ‘relic’ in age and disuse by now. Maybe he was something of a historian. They’d have to drop in one day, when they had the time to hear whatever he’d pieced together, and bring something he might like to encourage him to talk.

It might be fun to bring Hornet along, too. There was no way Lemm would know better than her, but Ghost was sure he’d think so, which probably wouldn’t end in a civilized, polite conversation. It was something to look forward to, Ghost thought.

Ghost finished demolishing their curtain, which they couldn’t help but marvel was exactly the same as a thousand others all across the City, and dragged the whole thing back to the library. Hornet was still passed out on the armchair, exactly as they’d left her, and the fire was still smoldering enough to take the new fuel it was offered, which Ghost cut into strips with their nail as they’d seen Hornet do.

The fire wasn’t as pretty or neat as hers always turned out, but it was warm nonetheless, and Ghost wiled away the next hour or so feeding it when it started to burn low and drawing on pages of map paper. They’d just put the finishing touches on a doodle of the Hollow Knight how they knew them best, as a Vessel just barely taller than Ghost standing beside a depiction of Hornet and Ghost themself, and had begun to ink in little hearts around them all when the actual Hornet stirred again.

They glanced up as she groaned and raised her head, then pushed herself up and rubbed tired fingers between her eyes.

“Hm?” She hummed in their general direction. It sounded like a question, at least.

Ghost greeted her with a nod, one she didn’t see with her face still cradled in her hand.

“Okay, I’m up.” Hornet rasped, and then cleared her throat and tried again. “I’m awake. Did you tend the fire?”

Ghost nodded again and gestured at the bare curtain rod, mostly decorated now with residual scraps. Hornet huffed a soft laugh to see their admittedly unpracticed handiwork and uncurled her legs from beneath her with hardly a wince.

“Next time take care to keep it lower than you think it should be. A smaller fire is a more easily handled one. And one less likely to set the room alight.” She advised.

Hornet stretched luxuriously, taking for once a moment to be still, reveling like Ghost in the warmth and the slow trickle of time like so much honey from a flask. And then she was rolling gracefully to her feet like a predator finding its footing, taking stock, reviewing with fearless, sharp eyes what needed to be done. As ever, her needle was immediately at hand, and she affixed it to her back with thin thread to be snapped the moment she had use for it.

Hornet rolled her shoulders to loosen them and stretched her arms out in front of her, hands splaying thin, claw-tipped fingers like black spiders in their own right, and Ghost saw when she caught sight of the pages they were packing away.

“What’s that?” She asked without any particular urgency. She blinked rapidly a few times, stifled another yawn, and crouched beside them for a closer look. “Is that you and I?”

Ghost nodded and showed her the page, which she took and examined with her usual efficient once-over.

“Is that… Another Vessel? One you know?” Hornet asked quietly.

Ghost nodded again, and opened and closed their hand pointedly a few times to request its return. Hornet obliged, but not before staring at it a little longer, lingering on the Hollow Knight’s face.

“I don’t believe I’ve ever seen them. Perhaps, then, they yet exist somewhere.” She said, voice carefully level.

Ghost nodded enthusiastically, and brought out their map to point to where they’d scribbled an approximation of the Black Egg Temple, up just below Dirtmouth’s boundaries. Hornet squinted at it, and then her face closed off. She stood up abruptly and took a deep, grounding breath.

“I see. The Hollow Knight. That’s what you’ve been after all along.” She told the fireplace without inflection. “Little Ghost, the Infection…” Hornet’s eyes hardened and she glanced sideways at them. “If you find them there, they will not be as you remember.”

No, Ghost expected they wouldn’t. They didn’t know what to expect, not at all. The Hollow Knight was in constant, unrelenting pain, and that did not come without consequences. All the more reason to surmount this final hurdle, and unseal them before anything else, anything irreparable, could happen. Just as the Hollow Knight had once submitted themself to certain death for the glimmer of a chance of clearing the way for them, unable to bear the thought of eternity as life in Void and too jaded to hope for a better way any longer, Ghost would now bare themself to the possibility of the same in the Hollow Knight’s name.

Perhaps they would all be fine, maybe their half-plan would work better than they could ever have imagined, and they would all be safe and alive to build a life in Hallownest’s ruin together. Ghost wouldn’t die, and neither would the Hollow Knight.

It would be worth it, whatever happened.

“Our goals still align. In freeing the Hollow Knight, you must in turn either end the Infection or replace its bearer.” Hornet told them, her voice harsh with forced assurance and having her own struggle, Ghost knew. “No matter how I might long for otherwise, my first and chiefest duty is still, and will always be, to Hallownest. I find I do not regret that, though ever it demands much of me. And while I suspect your feelings are much the same, I am not so self-deceiving as to think you reach for the same purpose.” Hornet said, and when she looked at them next it was with the respect of an equal, if not in cause then in understanding.

Ghost knew what she was trying to tell them. Their sister might love and care for them, as they loved and cared for her, but it wasn’t a matter of affection. It was a matter of what must be done, and to Hornet, that was preventing the final stone from falling in the utter collapse of her home and people. Ghost understood. Theirs _was_ a matter of affection, but they were equally committed. Always, always they had been too loyal.

And what would that loyalty be, if the Hollow Knight was saved at the cost of every other in the Kingdom? Ghost’s loyalty had expanded to include the welfare of so many, and they’d hardly noticed. Ghost would not allow them to suffer. If their plan worked, they wouldn’t.

How funny, that their goals had come to converge so neatly.

Ghost tilted their head to indicate Hornet to lead the way. The Protector of Hallownest appraised them with searching, unsympathetic eyes, as though evaluating one last time if her allegiance was properly given, and apparently found Ghost sufficient, for she acknowledged them in turn and left the room.

Ghost followed behind her, and thought with muted longing of the warm little library, gone cold and dark and silent again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Neither of them are "okay," per se, but they're both stubborn as hell and resilient as roaches. And besides, now they've got a plan! Or, Ghost does. Sort of. I mean, it could work. But there's some fluff here to balance out the angst!
> 
> I don't think I'll tag Lemm simply because his appearance was more of a cameo. He's happy just right where he is, thank you very much. Also, did I make an extremely vague pass at Bug Keats? Yes I did, and I have no good excuse other than I like the poem.
> 
> And now we, finally, draw close to the first Dreamer, where the most AU part of the AU begins. I was serious about the "Everyone Lives," thing.


	19. The City's Heights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The journey continues, but there is unrest. 
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Mild Infection gore, some good ol' husk murderin'

Hornet took them across half the Royal Quarter, to the very edge where the opulence began to taper back into efficiency, and then into the base of a tower that rose higher than any other, looming high and dark over even the highest and darkest of the rest of the City, its long, impenetrable windows like huge many-faceted eyes staring glumly out and weeping great sheets of rainwater that ran and collected and torrented down its reaching flanks.

Inside it were an unusual many collected husks, still jangling in finery and greater in variety than most others Ghost had encountered. It made sense that the nobles would have tried to distinguish themselves. Hornet, who had kept her distracted silence until this point, took perhaps a little too much pleasure in pointing out particular husks that she recognized.

“I killed that one the first time around.” She commented, indicating a trembling, wobbling specimen that had the peculiar habit, as Ghost watched, of striding up and rambling incoherently at its uncaring colleagues. “I have never had the patience for those with too much to say and no strength to back it up, and believe me when I say that fool had the most to say of any bug I’ve ever met, most of it absolute, dangerous nonsense. I’m nearly surprised I was the first to get tired of it.” Hornet said maliciously.

Ghost only looked at her, and she bristled a little. “I had, perhaps, less patience and experience then than I do now. I shouldn’t have killed him.” She admitted, like one admits they shouldn’t sleep in too late or take too much time in the hot spring. “It caused some trouble for Deepnest, back when such divisions mattered. But I was raised that if one is throwing insults, one should expect immediate retribution. How was I to know Hallownest bugs were so uncivilized, to let cruel folk get away with so much?”

As though to back up her point, she hefted her nail and, with a single decisive movement, killed the noble again with a dry, rippling _crack_.

Ghost found they couldn’t particularly fault her for that, though their own response to unkind words to themself was typically more tactful, if only in that they tended to restrain themself from stabbing as a warning.

Their path led upwards, following winding stairs stained black with mold and too little light and past doors left swung open and, occasionally, around doors too tightly shut to be budged, warped by the years. Ghost kept expecting them to come to a stop as they surmounted floor after floor, but Hornet showed no indication that they were nearing any sort of end. So Ghost kept on after her, cutting down husks that grew more widely spread out as they went, and, eventually, wondering if there could possibly be anything so tall as this tower.

It took hours only to climb the steps and pass each level just long enough to see a glimpse out the window as they found the next set, spiraling ever upward, and Ghost began to notice the tops of the towers around appearing lower and lower, even as the rooms they walked through became, though less overtly lavished with finery, more carefully designed, the tall windows smaller and each inlayed with metal frames shaped into Hallownest’s seal connecting the panes.

Ghost started to spot paintings, hidden in the shadows of the mildewing ceiling, first of bugs long-gone staring out from tenebrous frames and tarnished paint, warped by the water and humidity no place in the City could escape.

Then there were cityscapes, varying in color palette and style but each painted with skill and attentive, meticulous detail. It was around these levels that Hornet started to become impatient and hurry onward even as the endless climb began to wear on even her seemingly infinite stamina, hard-won traversing the Kingdom with regularity as she did. Ghost considered running ahead and waiting at the top just to annoy her, the dull repetition of the countless floors they’d passed and the doubtless countless floors to come beginning to wear on them, but reluctantly decided that probably wouldn’t be fair, considering she _had_ carried them halfway through the City not a day before.

And then, they weren’t entirely sure she was in a joking mood. She’d been unusually quiet as they steadily approached the Watcher’s chambers, and Ghost was unsure that it was entirely because she was embarrassed for getting tired.

The paintings kept catching Ghost’s eye as they followed, untiring and bored, until they realized they were all of the City of Tears. Each detailed masterpiece, and they were many, was of nearly the same place. They hadn’t noticed at first, as the paintings ranged from a viewpoint so high it had to have been from the very tip of a tower, to close enough to read the signs on the shops and see the lanternlight reflecting in the damp masks of the bugs it shone on, echoed like a string of lumaflies on the ridges of their black shells.

Ghost caught Hornet’s shawl with a claw, to her breathless growl of irritation, and pointed at one.

“The Watcher Lurien,” She paused for breath, still gamely refusing to slow down. “Was an equally famous artist.” Hornet glanced briefly at the nearest painting. “Cityscapes. Of course.”

“And,” Hornet continued, “he was not fond of visitors.” She panted, like the tower had been built to spite her. “There should be an elevator, not much further.” Hornet glared down at Ghost, easily keeping pace with her. “Where was this energy when I had to carry you around for days on end? I should have left you to the husks.” She spat with more tired exasperation than venom.

Ghost shrugged, unmoved, and they carried on. Hornet’s estimation quickly proved to be better than desperate hope, and it was only a handful more floors before they came to a nearly entirely empty room, just as dimly lit and faded as the rest but with the exciting inclusion of a narrow, open sided elevator at one end. Ghost pretended not to hear Hornet’s half-muffled sigh of relief, for her benefit.

“Come on, we’re nearly there. That we haven’t run into even a single knight so far, living or dead, is… Concerning. Though I had no contact with the bug, I am aware that the Pale King would not choose an unguarded fool for a Dreamer. This leaves the possibility that instead of spreading out his entourage, the Watcher had the wits to consolidate his forces to a single line of defense. Though how they expected to last, waiting so far from supplies or help, I can’t imagine.” Hornet mumbled, ever rational.

Ghost trusted her judgement, and waited for her decision.

“If they’d waited there, they’re surely dead. If they’d left to sustain themselves, I’d have noticed. I should have considered this sooner,” She admonished. “How long has the Watcher been dreaming completely unguarded? An unacceptable oversight.”

Hornet snorted mirthlessly. “I’d trusted the Pale King to at least have his own best interests in mind, and to do his part in preparing his ill-fated plan, but I suppose he couldn’t even do that.”

“At least it falls in our favor now. Would you do the honors?” Hornet gestured to the elevator lever, which Ghost struck with gusto, emboldened by the idea of an easy victory, just this once.

The elevator lurched unevenly and began to tick slowly upwards. Ghost felt something prickle in their mind as they went, singing and calling and subtly, searingly enraged. The Infection, they startled to recognize. They’d gotten so practiced at ignoring it that, now that its hum was strong enough to call their attention, it had grown to a buzzing fervor, whispering of belonging and hate and life and vicious anger. Ghost drew their nail.

“What’s wrong?” Hornet asked even as she drew her own weapon, settling it practiced and poised in her hand.

Ghost didn’t respond other than to shake their head, eyes fixed to the landing they could see drawing near as the hum grew and sang.

The elevator ground to a halt, and all was quiet save the rhythmic drum of sheets of rain outside. Ahead was a short hall, and past that, a room with a dim orange glow, faint and pulsing.

Hornet kept silent upon seeing it, eyes cutting and focused and her shoulders rigid beneath her shawl, and stalked forward. Ghost did much the same, stance a little looser and nearly more curious about what had caused such a deep-seated clawing anger, scrabbling at their unyielding mind for a chance that wouldn’t come, than watchful for a coming fight.

The room they stepped into was nearly a cavern in its own right, wide and with a tall, arching roof hung with massive chandeliers, some still lit with intact lumaflies glowing brightly against the gloom. And still brighter, darting between the chandeliers and heavy hanging swathes of black-rotted ceiling, were a great many more. These lumaflies glowed with all the fervor of their whitelit kin, but colored a fierce and burning orange that clouded and swarmed near the ceiling in a jerky, uncoordinated mob.

And sitting as though resting throughout the room were great, round-shelled bugs, immense and holding massive nails loosely in relaxed, brittle claws, their dark eyes vacant and long-hollowed. The infected lumaflylight overhead danced over their shells, dull with age and dust and implacable as uncaring stone beneath the flitting flight's fiery glow.

Hornet took a measured step into the chamber, waited for a retaliation that didn’t come, and then another. She then made an abrupt motion with her head to encourage Ghost, who wasn’t waiting for a signal but appreciated the thought.

Ghost stepped closer to inspect one of the ancient knights as Hornet hummed in disappointment and strode across the room with purpose, making for the far side that promised to open to the path forward. She’d nearly crossed the floor, her claws clicking against the rough-hewn stone nearly drowned out by the buzzing above, when the Infection's blinding, distant fury spiked suddenly.

A stream of lumaflies came down from the cloud, maddened and bumping into each other and then the horned face of the dead knight as they poured in double buzzing swarms down its open eye sockets, until some critical mass was reached and the knight’s hand twitched spasmodically, curling falteringly around the handle of its greatnail.

Hornet hissed something furious and was across the room in an instant, leaping as though she weighed nothing at all onto the great knight’s back as it stood up, its movements already nearly as fluid as in life, and drove her needle into the back of its neck. It sunk in with a loud, wet snap of broken chitin and dripping Infection, and the knight roared piercingly.

The sound startled Ghost, for it had the same desperate, pained, _furious_ quality to it as the Hollow Knight’s call, the part of it not given through void, when they’d heard it up close. The sound, Ghost realized, of an infected creature overwhelmed by the sickness’ fury.

They nearly didn’t dodge when the knight swung its massive nail at them in a blow that might have cleaved their mask from their shoulders, something that Hornet shouted angrily at them for.

“Pay attention, Ghost!” She called down to them from her vantage point atop the knight, and then yanked free her needle with a shattering crunch.

The stricken, massive knight she clung to leaned back some, and then pitched forward so suddenly that it threw Hornet completely off, and she twisted midair to land on her feet next to Ghost.

Behind them, then, came another shriek, and Ghost looked to see a second knight-husk lurching to its feet and hefting its nail.

Ghost bounced their own nail in their hand and launched themself at it, swiping a gash into its side and darting past as it swung at them, faster than they thought a corpse had a right to move, even one reanimated by vengeful anger. Ghost caught it’s unprotected back in another punishing slash, the force of the blow more than the sharpness of their blade carving a wide crack in the dusty shell.

It turned with a wider swing of its greatnail that Ghost had to jump back from, and then, to Ghost’s surprise, hurled itself forward with a loud, grating creak of ancient, eroded chitin, and kept rolling. They only just leapt over it, trailing cloak brushing over its shell and buffeted by the displacement of air as it passed, and it only gained momentum until it bounced violently off the far wall with a splitting crack and came hurtling back, vast and broken-rough as a felled fragment of mountainside, so quickly that had Ghost any slower reflex to lunge aside they might not have cleared the way fast enough.

Some ways off, Hornet gave her exhilarated battle cry and Ghost heard the splitting of thick shell, crackling like thunder, and a hiss like escaping steam, and then the hollow snap of dry chitin hitting stone.

Not to be outdone, Ghost saw their own knight slow to a stop and uncurl, lumbering to meet them, and before it could try again they were upon it, bringing their little nail down with all their might upon the knight’s nail-bearing arm, which shattered under the blow and hung useless. The knight reared back to headbutt them, or perhaps to roll again, but Ghost followed it up and, bracing themself with its arching horns, gashed at the juncture of its head and thorax with their blade.

So precisely directed, the sharp edge did wonders and the dead knight’s head, already poorly affixed to its shoulders and elytra by slick Infection and dry viscera, hung half-detached with the single hit. For a moment dried flesh creaked and inside its shell, Ghost could see the unilluminating glow of liquid Infection pooling in hollow joints and congealing, gleaming and wet, beneath the constant dart and twitch of the lumaflies, and then Ghost leapt free as the monstrous husk’s shell groaned like straining metal.

It collapsed to the floor, burning lumaflies tricking from its neck and then flooding from it, taking instead to the next rotted knight’s unopened shell.

And so they fought on. Ghost was delighted by the chance to try their nail, and to throw themself at something that didn’t need to be thought about or planned around or _cared_ for, and from the glimpses they caught of Hornet’s own merciless offense she might have felt the same. It had been too long since they’d had a really good battle, where they could stretch the limits of their ability and let themself use memory and experience that they could never truly forget.

When the last shell of the long-dead knights fell for the second time, Ghost landed lightly on the floor, and Hornet likewise. Ghost was aware they’d gone unnaturally still, as they tended to do when they weren’t occupied with trying to express themself, but Hornet was almost equally poised, hardly out of breath and with her eyes bright and glinting in the light.

They stared at their downed opponents, broken under their force and still once more, until they were sure they couldn’t get back up, and then Hornet broke the silence with a high thrill of a laugh.

It was over nearly before it started and she cleared her throat, putting away her needle. “You fought well, little Ghost. The way should be clear now, I doubt there would be another line of defense past this.” She said, already shaking off the adrenaline.

Ghost beamed at the praise and consciously relaxed into a more natural stance, letting the focus of combat fall away as they settled their own weapon against their back and followed her out of the open room and into the narrower corridors.

There were more portraits here, Ghost noticed, but these had a different feel to them. The brushstrokes were looser, and the colors brighter and less stringently realistic. The figured depicted within were smiling, or holding scrolls of spider-silk weave, or any number of other little details that made them seem more alive, more like living bugs and less like a carefully curated memory. The halls were narrower, and much of the padding and fluff typical of the Royal Quarter was replaced by hard floors and wrought iron, winding like spindly roots through window panes and up walls.

The next elevator wasn’t far at all, this one more bare-bones than the last but nearly silent when Hornet stepped on. Ghost craned around its cold, curving metal top, looking up to see where it would take them to little avail, for while the cool, rippling light fading in from the windows to the side of the elevator shaft was enough to see by, the chain it hung from simply went up too far to find the heights it reached.

“This will take us to the Dreamer, I think. Even looking out the window, I couldn’t imagine there is much tower left to climb.” Hornet said in a way that made Ghost think she was extremely glad this was the case, even if she wouldn’t abide by sounding too obviously relieved.

Ghost stepped onto the elevator, noticing with tentative hope that it barely creaked under their weight, and hit the lever to send them up.

The deceptively steady mechanism immediately shrieked like its joints would wrench themselves from the elevator cage, but before Ghost could think to do anything the elevator shot up like it had been waiting on coiled springs for the opportunity, nearly throwing Ghost off the side before they caught their balance. Hornet reacted much quicker and hardly staggered, but still caught at an iron support in a steel-clawed grip.

It was disorienting to say the least, but once Ghost got used enough to the momentum their fascination was captured and held by the view out the window, and they made their way to the side closest to it, keeping a healthy grip on the railing as the light it cast ran quick shadows over them like thoughts.

Outside, the City of Tears was beautiful.

The city below gleamed, painted in watercolor blues and rich greys and smudges of far-off lumafly light like stars over a lake, and though they were rising by floors every second the streets and towers were so far off that their position, so reminiscent of the paintings lining the halls below, only shifted with slow gravity like the turn of the heavens.

Ghost was higher by far than their first rain-distorted glimpse of the wonders of the City of Tears, empty and waiting for bugs that no longer lived, and they could take in nearly the entire expanse of cresting towers and diving streets, and feel again the melancholy of looking over something that was nearly alive, but soulless and still. Ghost wondered if this was how Hornet felt, looking over Hallownest. Like there should have been people there, and though they were gone the need to protect them lived on.

Ghost wondered when they’d started to feel it, too.

Behind them, they began to pass statues set into the wall, each of the same tall, cloaked figure with a simple mask, just a single black hole in the center. They shot by so quickly that at first Ghost had thought it a trick of the light, having not been looking directly at it, and then several more raced by before they could place why the figure was familiar.

It was the likeness of one of the Dreamers, who they’d seen when the three had tried to imprison them in the world of dreams. The smallest one, thin and almost formless.

When the elevator stopped abruptly, Ghost rode out the jolting with a wide stance and a tight grip on the iron side, but without stumbling. Hornet stepped off as though unshaken, and Ghost followed, looking around at what could only have been the Dreamer’s resting place.

It was very dim, the shadows rich and deep and the warm light of lit candles, some of the first Ghost had seen in Hallownest, cast what furniture and furnishings remained in flickering, welcoming contrast. The ceiling dripped steadily in places, creating chilly puddles on the floor, black along their edges and slimy with age. Along one wall were windows that rose floor to ceiling, dripping with rain and looking down over the entirety of the City of Tears.

And in one corner was a telescope and chair, the floor beside it cluttered with tablets scrawled with messy handwriting, and beside those was a painting. It was lovely to Ghost, all dripping color and reaching, thorn-like black spires studded with the bright rain-smeared halos of lit windows. It was of a living city, filled with light and life and presided over by the ever-present rain, as witnessed through a window running with it and obscuring the fine details. A living city, yet something seemed very sad about it. The colors ran too freely in places, the shadows behind the lights too dark and encompassing, the rain too thick and heavy, like the blur of falling tears making the whites and yellows of the lit windows smear just a little too far.

And one part of the painting, a corner, was rougher-edged than the rest. Unfinished.

“Lurien the Watcher,” Hornet said grimly. “Was not a disliked person. And clearly the King liked him well enough to entrust him with this task. Or perhaps it wasn’t a question of personal taste at all, but the height of his tower that granted him this… Unfortunate honor. It hardly matters. Do as you will, Ghost, so we can leave.”

She seemed impatient as she studied a dripping window, more illuminated by its cold shifting light than by the candles, but more than that, Hornet seemed more distant than Ghost thought she would have been, having guarded the Dreamers’ seals for so long. There was something fragile about the set of her shoulders, something avoidant about the tilt of her horns, like the Dreamer’s still body wasn’t something she could look at too closely.

Ghost turned away from the painting, feeling something like reluctance, though they couldn't place why, and where Hornet gestured lay Lurien on his dais.

They were surprised by how small he seemed, much larger than they but with a sort of frailty about him, only the very ends of his thin legs visible at the end of his long, concealing cloak. Beyond his dais, Ghost noticed, was a husk crouched in the shadows.

Hornet must not have seen it, though its eyes burned as two pits of flame, like the candles nearby. Only, it was very strange, Ghost thought, that the candles would be lit after all this time. Hornet wouldn’t have led them past the Watcher’s knights if there was an alternative, and Ghost was sure no one would have gotten past their haunted guard before.

Yet the candles were lit, and the husk sat quietly and stared.

Ghost tilted their head at it, but it only watched. They drew out the Dream Nail’s handle, and it didn’t twitch.

Hornet would keep them safe, no matter what happened, Ghost thought as they drew the gleaming, singing nail back and struck at the Watcher’s body.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the real sub-AU here is that stairs exist in Hallownest, because I say they do. 
> 
> I specifically looked up if insects use adrenaline as a stress-response hormone so you don’t have to. Like, I went and read the appropriate section of a NCBI paper to figure it out. Never let it be said I did not spend time and effort on this thing.  
> And apparently the answer is no! The analogous hormone to adrenaline (or epinephrine, another name for the molecule) is octopamine in many insects. The study was specifically on honeybee stress responses, but I think whatever the hell Hornet is, is probably close enough. 
> 
> This is all a moot point, because "octopamine" does not read as clearly or obviously as "adrenaline," which is a little bit of a bummer, but such is fate. Who knows, maybe half-wyrms are more akin to mammals in their stress-response neurohormonal cascades. Morphology based phylogeny is just like that. But here's your fun entomology fact for the day!


	20. One Who Sees All and Knows Nothing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Watcher Lurien awakens.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Brief Infection body horror, courtesy of Hollow.
> 
> And look! Art!   
> https://cabopineforest.tumblr.com/post/614752928666894336/a-fanart-for-chapter-20-of-where-song-lies-still

They were asleep, for the second time. This time, though, Ghost had gone in knowing what to expect, and so when they sat up to see spirographs twirling lazily through the air, blinking in and out like so many lights passing behind a raised hand, they weren’t thrown off enough to be taken in by it.

The dream was different this time, though. The clouds weren’t soft and welcoming as a spring morning, but heavy and thick. Where they rose, and they did rise like fog rolling in from a sea, they were the color of burned dust, murky and choking. Behind the furthest, and below those that roiled and met seamlessly with the black of the night overhead, the sky they could see was a cruel red and shifting like the turbid clouds hid a smoldering, growing wildfire.

But around Ghost the air was as cool as the night breeze, and carried no smoke. They were standing on a simple stone podium, streaked black by ages and the same charred grey as the tall, thorn-like growths emerging like arching, jagged horns from the clouds below, their size made indecipherable by the ever-shifting distance of the clouds in any specificity beyond ‘huge’.

And before them was Lurien, floating upright over the podium with his head tilted down some, as though tired or already asleep. Like a hanged bug he swung gently, the edges of his cloak shifting in the wind and his mask a pale, scored moon against the burned sky.

So this was one of the Dreamers, the living connection that the seals containing the Hollow Knight drew power from.

Ghost thought they would have hated the creature to take part in the Hollow Knight’s sealing. There was every indication that he’d done it on purpose, after all, knowing exactly what was being done and exactly why. His seal had been one of the three to stop Ghost from opening the Black Egg weeks ago, and Ghost was nothing but aware of the consequences.

Yet, something gave Ghost pause. They drew the Dream Nail, gratified to find it still accessible within the dream, and lashed its insubstantial blade through Lurien’s still form.

A thought whispered through Ghost’s mind, in an unfamiliar voice, unlike the silent thought of void. “For King beloved…”

They stuck out again. “To sleep. To serve.” Again. “Bonds must remain.” Again. “Remain…” The voice, Lurien’s voice, murmured.

No. No, that wasn’t good enough. Ghost would kill Lurien, if that was what it took, but a question burned unrelenting within them; why?

Ghost wanted to know why. A quiet person, prone to isolation yet not disliked by others by Hornet’s own words, which was tantamount to existing as a public favorite by translation. An artist, who wept through his work. Why would he choose to do such a cruel thing, and why would he sacrifice himself to eternity for it?

They had to know.

Ghost raised the Dream Nail. It hummed in their hand, charging and gleaming, shifting with energy. They held it there, and it glowed brighter and hummed more powerfully until their hand went numb with the vibration and they couldn’t see past the blinding glare.

Then, they lashed out ahead.

There was a snap like a thick rope pulling taut and breaking in an instant, and a muffled thump and clatter.

As the light faded from Ghost’s eyes and they could see past it again, they saw Lurien lying on the ground. And as they watched, he began to stir.

“My King, I am here,” Lurien breathed, pushing against the ground with shaky, spindly arms before hidden in the folds of his cloak.

Ghost watched him struggle, panting with effort in moments, and then collapse to the stone, cloak shifting with his heaving breath.

They waited a beat more, hand reaching for their nail, before reaching a decision instead.

Ghost knelt down beside Lurien and helped him sit up, moving slowly as the awoken bug trembled and shook.

“Thank you,” Lurien’s soft voice came from behind his mask. “I don’t know what’s come over me. Is something the matter? I thought I’d… I thought I had gone to sleep.”

Ghost did nothing, only watched him as he breathed deeply and consciously, as though reminding himself how. Lurien must have been expecting a reply, because after a beat or two he glanced up at them and went stiff.

“Oh. Who are you? No, no, I know you,” He mumbled. “You’re the Pale Vessel. How can you be here?”

Lurien made a quiet, horrified noise. “It didn’t work, did it? Oh, Wyrm, it didn’t work? How long has it been?”

He looked Ghost over, and they could only stand and stare.

“Not so long, you’re so young. I’d thought you were older.” Lurien breathed. “I’d thought you were so much older.” He sounded close to tears, his voice wavering and going thin.

“Little Vessel, I apologize to you.” He said to them. “On behalf of us all. How could you have chosen this? You’re so very young.” He repeated.

“But don’t worry,” Lurien reassured, as though Ghost were the one on the verge of weeping, and truthfully, perhaps Lurien was weeping already behind his blank mask. “If I am awoken, then the Pale King must have changed his mind. And thank Wyrm for that, I miss them already.” Lurien laughed a little, somewhat self-consciously. “Ah, don’t tell the King I said that. But yes, yes, our beloved King has found a better path. I knew he would,” And Lurien’s voice brimmed with confidence and awed affection.

If Ghost had not pitied him before, they did now.

Lurien didn’t need to die, Ghost realized. More than that, they didn’t want to kill him. Ghost was not one to regret killing, but that was largely limited to beasts and husks, and in defense. There was no use in meaningless death, however cathartic, and great value in kindness, Ghost knew. And Hallownest was a kingdom bereft of it, at least in its King’s actions. Hallownest needed kindness, and if Ghost could give it that by forgiving a regretful Dreamer of an ancient crime, then so be it.

And, really, when one put it like that it was something poetic, to undo the Pale King’s will this way.

Ghost held their hand out to Lurien.

“Ah, thank you again, little one. My age must be catching up to me. All those hours behind the telescope, I imagine.” He said cheerily, and took it.

Ghost swung the Dream Nail and the dream burst into fractals, and just like before, they woke up lying collapsed on the ground.

“Ghost, are you alright? Is he dead?” Hornet asked, already at their side.

She started to say something else, but then Ghost’s mind exploded in agony.

It was so much worse this time. The Hollow Knight’s agonized, shrieking call resounded across void and space and Ghost felt it like their own. The strain, the unending ripping tearing _strain_ that they tried, they tried so very hard to hold fast against, it sensed a gap in its bonds and _pushed_. And this time, there came a tiny tear.

It was hot, burning like it cauterized their thin, broken chitin and seared their void back like so much singed flesh as a thin thread of the Radiance’s influence wormed and squeezed and threw itself with abandon into the smallest crack in it, a point of give at last. They tried desperately to shade it out, to knit together void that was tired and stretched thin as dawn shadow, but the light was compact and determined and vicious and equally desperate.

It made their mind reel in sickened, terrified horror to feel it outside of them, only the slightest glow and the first drip of orange like liquid, moldering sun, but slowly, patiently, with claws and buffeting wings and vindictive seeping disgust prising their chest apart.

The Hollow Knight begged with all the mind they had left to them, long since abandoned the emptiness, holding their fragile body together only by sheer force of will and fever-bright, maddening fear of letting go. It was a fear the Radiance fed from and into, but as it spiraled uncontrollably higher, they only clutched tighter.

Somewhere distant, their arm creeped and deadened where it connected to their torso, the joint rotted and eaten away.

Ghost became aware of themself again all at once.

They were shaking, badly, and their equilibrium was shot. The world flipped sickeningly over on itself, twisting over and around until they could only bury their face in the warm fabric it was lain on.

An equally warm hand smoothed over the back of their mask with gentle claws. Hornet. Ghost could have cried in relief, and found they already were. There was a dull roar as their void churned within them, swirling and disturbed by the feeling of how thin the Hollow Knight’s own was, burned through by light.

It made them feel like theirs would do the same, knowing so clearly how the Hollow Knight suffered. And nearly worse, to know that there was nothing they could do that they weren’t already.

They would have to be patient, Ghost reminded themself muzzily. They had to do this right, no matter what.

So Ghost dug their claws into her shawl in lieu of their own chitin and waited. Hornet was a solid presence, and a reassuring one for multiple reasons, not the least of which that they could trust her to defend herself without them. They could focus on the weight of her hand instead of the bite of their claws to ground themself with, and the gentle pressure helped settle their void. It gave it a point of reference, an indication that there wasn’t anything to be worked up about in the calm air around them, cooler than Infection and empty of void, and the tactile sensation to make the thought stick, and slowly, slowly, Ghost calmed down.

As their void quieted, they realized Hornet had their head in her lap, and that she was saying something, her tone even and unconcerned.

It was only when they began to regain the ability to decipher language and think properly again that they understood that that was probably entirely for their benefit.

“You have done a poor job explaining yourself,” Hornet was saying gently. “And if you don’t do any better, my needle will have less mercy than my sibling.”

“Please, I’ve told you what happened. The Pale Vessel-“

“Ghost. Their name is Ghost.”

“Ghost, then. They found me in dream, and awakened me somehow. Then they took a shining, unusually small nail and struck out at nothing, and the dream collapsed, and now I’m awake. Now, I only wish to speak with the Pale King, to know his new plan.”

“His new plan to do what?” Hornet inquired, her hand never stopping its calming petting.

“Why, to save us from the Infection, of course! He must-!”

“Keep your voice down, or I will break it.” Hornet threatened in an undertone. “How long were you in dream?”

“Not long at all, I think.” Lurien whispered, audibly frightened. “With the Pale V- with Ghost so young, it couldn’t have been a few months, or a year or two. That’s what happened, isn’t it? The Pale King realized his plan was too cruel, and found a better one in the intervening months? It has been months, yes? Or just weeks?”

“Watcher,” Hornet said solemnly. “It has been more years than I can count. Hallownest is long dead, and so is the Pale King.”

“No, that can’t be right. Who are you?” Lurien denied.

“I am Hornet, Protector of Hallownest, Princess of Deepnest. I have been the last defender of Hallownest’s corpse nearly as long as I’ve been alive.” Hornet said quietly. “And I know better than any the cost of the Infection. If you disbelieve me, look out your window.”

Ghost heard the rustle of fabric as, presumably, Lurien stood to do just that. He stumbled more than once, and Ghost listened to his claws grate on metal fixtures he must have grabbed at for support, but Hornet never stood to help. Fortunately, Lurien must have gotten some of his strength back, as they heard him collapse with a gasp in the general direction of the chair by the telescope.

There was quiet, with only the near-silent rasp of Hornet’s claws rubbing gently between their horns. Ghost’s head ached with a vengeance, and they tentatively began to focus the soul necessary to dampen the pain.

“It’s nighttime, I suppose,” Lurien mumbled from the window. “All the windows are dark. All of them. The windows are never all dark, the bakery is always on in the night hours, the umbrella crafter is never closed, why are they gone?”

“ _Where_ have they all gone?” Lurien’s voice was very small, and in it they could hear him desperate to be wrong.

“Where is your Pale King now?” Hornet said to him. “Everyone is dead. Hundreds of thousands of souls the City held, all snuffed. His plan wasn’t taken back; it failed. Utterly.” She said ruthlessly, and pulled Ghost that little bit closer. They felt her shiver, belying her harsh tone.

Their headache had faded some, and their limbs felt like they would respond, so Ghost twitched to sit up. Hornet immediately let them go and let them use her to lever themself upright, and Ghost enfolded her in a hug that was as much for her benefit as their own.

Hornet jerked in surprise, like being offered comfort even now was so foreign that their sister who expected everything hadn’t thought to anticipate it. She shivered again when Lurien made a low, despairing noise, and let Ghost hold her.

“Some of the fault is my own.” She said aloud, her voice as measured as ever. “In the Pale King’s absence, and the Queen’s disappearance, and the Great Knights’ deaths and banishment, there was no one to oversee the Kingdom. And I failed in my duty to it, in allowing so many to perish.”

Ghost shook their head firmly, and Lurien said nothing.

“There was nothing to be done,” He spoke up finally. “Not without our King. He is the creator and soul of our Kingdom, and without him it is nothing.”

Hornet scoffed. “You speak so highly of him. What commands such loyalty? Was it what made you agree to become a Dreamer?”

“It was the only thing to do.” Lurien said stubbornly. “My King came to me and asked me to sacrifice myself to ensure Hallownest’s future. I didn’t need to know anything more than that.”

“That can’t be all. What did he give you for it?” Hornet pressed, escaping Ghost’s hold to turn on him. There was a despairing gleam in her eye. “What did he barter for your life?”

“Nothing. He didn’t need to.” Lurien replied. “I loved my painting and my people and my dear friends, but I still agreed to sleep. This was the right path, the only path. If the King was convinced there was no other way, after he also gave up so much-“

“Oh? What did he give up?” Hornet demanded.

“His own child!” Lurien exclaimed. “Years of his life, searching for a cure, for an answer to our pleading!”

“Do you know anything?” Hornet said in disgust, turning away and pacing the candlelit study. “Do you know anything at all about what he asked you to do, or did you close your big staring eye and do exactly as he instructed without any question?”

“I know exactly what I did! I was to sleep-“

“Not of _your_ consequences.” Hornet interrupted. “Do you even know how many Vessels were made?”

“Just… What? Just the one, of course.”

“No. Thousands. Maybe more. Children, all. And what did he do when they began to escape, once the Hollow Knight had been sealed, and threatened his carefully laid, doomed plan?” Hornet asked mockingly.

“I-“

“He tasked the Protector of Hallownest with taking care of his dirty work. The Pale King took my mother, and then demanded a place in my greatest regrets. And I _allowed_ it. Because I was so certain, then, that the cost was so great, and the stakes so high, that if I only did as he commanded it would work. I would never live a day without blood on my hands, but Hallownest would be safe. Does this sound familiar? Did you think the same, that asking so much, the only possible outcome was success?” Hornet hissed vehemently at him.

“The Pale King is gone. Hallownest is dead. There is only us, and the ruins, and a handful of scavengers and mapmakers and adventurers left. And even they are in terrible danger.” Hornet raged. “And I have come too far and given too much to give up now, Pale King or no. Whatever remains, I _will_ give them a future.”

She took a deep breath in the ensuing silence, Lurien staring at her, half-hunched over his chair, and then let it out in a slow exhale.

“You’ve made the wrong choice, and you’ve been given your life back to try again.” She said, her voice rough and fervent and tired, all her energy gone. “That’s more than anyone else got. Live. Or don’t. But there is no room for blind loyalty now.”

Lurien only stared at her, but Hornet didn’t meet his gaze.

She sighed again, eyes narrowed in distaste. “I doubt there’s anything in the way of supplies left here, either. Arm yourself, and make your way to King’s Station. Ring for the Stag. Go to Dirtmouth, and seek help there. Unless you want to die in your comfortable little hovel at the top of the world.” Hornet instructed him coldly.

Lurien didn’t reply, but Hornet nodded like he had and turned to leave. Ghost followed her quietly, and as they left spotted the bright eyes of the husk once again. They could have sworn they saw the eyes dip, as though in a shallow nod, and then they were gone after Hornet.

She made it as far as the base of that long, hurtling elevator before she was muttering irately to them.

“I can’t believe myself. I didn’t even threaten him properly, Ghost. You’re a terrible influence on me.” Hornet tossed at them over her shoulder.

Ghost tilted their head, bewildered, before they realized she must have thought she’d been very soft on Lurien indeed. And, they realized with a flood of amused fondness, by Hornet standards, she had been. They pitied the Watcher, left alone in his empty tower in the middle of his dead city that had only a night ago, from his perspective, been alive and hopeful. It was a cruel fate, and a harsh realization to throw at him without support or guidance. Lurien did not strike them as an especially resilient person when confronted with change.

But then, Ghost was just as uncertain of their own feelings. They had chosen to allow him to live, however hard that might be for him, but he had still been a Dreamer. And while Ghost was not one to take vengeance for themself, the abrupt reminder of the Hollow Knight’s unspeakable, ongoing sacrifice had them nearly regretting their actions.

But no. One couldn’t take back death. And Ghost was forced to the understanding, by Lurien’s ignorance if nothing else, that there was no reason to kill him.

But letting him figure out the way to the stag station on his own was not below them.

“Absolutely ridiculous,” Hornet was still complaining as they passed by the remains of the fallen Watcher’s knights and onto the second elevator. “I even gave him _directions_.”

Ghost patted at her arm as high as they could reach, to reassure her that they still knew she was as stalwart and ruthless as ever, even if even they weren’t totally sure of that.

Hornet made a disgusted noise. “Don’t give me that, I’m going _soft_.” She lamented. 

Ghost didn’t try to contain their laughter. She couldn’t hear it, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hornet honestly expected better of one of the Dreamers she'd been guarding for centuries, so Lurien was maybe a little... Underwhelming. Especially with her other ties to the Dreamers. But she didn't kill him outright, which is good. You know how sometimes you want to leave a mob alive (or, for example, Myla once she's fully infected) but Grimmchild just goes ape on it behind your back? She did not do that, and Ghost should be proud.
> 
> Anywho, I was serious about the "Everybody Lives," thing. The Dream Nail is a neat little artifact. Something I noticed about it is that you can't choose to hold it aloft until you're ready to use it, like you can a nail art. And I mean, it's called a DREAM nail. If it can't mess up dreams then what's the use.


	21. The Now and the Then

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No good deed goes unpunished.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Nothing drastic. Past manipulation. Hornet is not a nice person, again.

They spiraled back down from the height of the Watcher’s Spire, and there Hornet plotted their next step.

“The Teacher’s Archives, I think.” She told them, looking over their map. She pointed a finger at a blank section, indicating part of Hallownest Ghost had never seen.

They’d been neglecting their map recently, relying entirely on Hornet’s guidance. She knew Hallownest like the back of her hand, and it showed, so there was little reason to waste time plotting out and exploring the ways they traveled when she could take them directly where they needed to go. And Ghost hadn’t even tried to map out the City of Tears, nor did they think their map was long enough to include the heights of the Kingdom’s Edge without modification.

“Yes, within the Fog Canyon. I am familiar with the place, and with the road to it, but I dislike traveling there. The air is dense and heavy with moisture and the walls are covered with viscous bubbles, such that sound doesn’t travel right. Though they’re satisfying to pop.” Hornet mused.

“Your Stag should be able to carry us as far as the Crossroads, yes?” Hornet asked, and Ghost nodded to affirm.

“And Dirtmouth? He knows the way to Dirtmouth?”

Ghost nodded again. They thought he did, at least.

“Good. I’m low on supplies, and your pen is falling apart. We’ll stop there and restock, and then go through the Crossroads to get to the Archives.” Hornet folded their map back up decisively, as though it had served in any way other than to indicate their general destination for Ghost’s benefit, and handed it back.

Ghost accepted the slightly tattered collection of pages and put it away while Hornet squinted out through the rain with resignation.

“The fastest way to King’s Station is outside,” She conceded without enthusiasm, and Ghost felt they shared her approximate level of excitement. Their cloak wasn’t the type to dry especially quickly, and it was always uncomfortable until it did.

They were about to brave the elements regardless when there was a clatter and a heavy thump behind them.

Ghost turned around, almost dreading what they’d find, and saw without particular surprise that it was Lurien, who had fallen down the last few steps in his haste to catch them before they left.

“Wait,” He gasped. “Wait for me, I’m coming.”

Ghost saw, with mounting despair, that he was lugging a long, light nail that he must have been very fortunate not to catch himself on in his fall. They glanced at Hornet, and saw reflected on her face their distaste for what was about to happen. Hornet looked like she’d bitten something sour, and she glared down at Lurien while he caught his breath and scrambled to his feet.

“Are you going towards the King’s Station?” Lurien asked with resolve once he’d composed himself. “I’m afraid I’m not sure of the way.”

Ghost almost thought Hornet would lie and say they were going anywhere else, but she only closed her eyes a moment as though praying for strength and consciously released the grip she’d had on her needle’s handle.

“Yes,” She gritted out. “We are headed that way. I suppose you’ll be wanting to take advantage of our blades?”

Lurien balked, and Ghost wondered how there could be anyone left so affected by giving the impression that they were being impolite. “No, of course not! I have my own, I can defend myself,” Lurien said, and sounded exactly like someone who couldn’t defend himself. “Only I’ve never been out of the City from that direction, and I don’t know the way. I was hoping that you would be so gracious as to allow me to accompany you to it, if it turned out our destinations aligned.” He said, and Ghost could hear the desperation in his voice.

Ghost wavered, and gave in. He seemed so earnest, and so unjaded Ghost didn’t know how they could be unnecessarily cruel to him. Did he know that they’d entered his tower in the hopes of killing him?

They looked up at Hornet, who scowled back. “I already said we’re going to the stag station, what more do you want of me?”

“Nothing at all,” Lurien said hurriedly, mistaking the complaint as directed at him. “Only guidance, and then I’ll be gone. How far off is the stag station? Twenty minutes, a half hour?”

“Half a day. It’s across the Royal Quarter.” Hornet growled.

“Oh. That’s a long way. I forgot my umbrella.” Lurien said faintly.

“I’m torn with pity.” Hornet ground out sarcastically. “Let’s go. Keep up, or we’ll leave you behind.”

And with that she stepped out into the rain, striding away with purpose.

Ghost tilted their head sympathetically at Lurien, who looked down at them, inscrutable behind his mask and somehow baleful, and followed her. Over the immediate rush and roar of the rain, they could hear his fast footsteps behind them, hurrying to catch up for all that Ghost wasn’t a third his height.

In spite of Hornet’s threatening, they walked slower than they might have otherwise, and Lurien still struggled to keep up. Whenever Ghost looked back at him he somehow seemed newly pathetic, panting from their untiring pace and soaked through, such that his long cloak clung to his body, somehow spindlier than they’d thought.

Ghost recalled that he hadn’t actually moved in nearly an age. Of course he would be struggling, bugs got very stiff when they didn’t move for a while. Hornet was an excellent example of that, her joints cracked like splitting chitin whenever she sat still too long. It sounded painful, no matter how she always seemed unaffected by the release of tension, so Ghost couldn’t imagine how uncomfortable Lurien must be.

Once an hour had passed and Hornet was showing no signs of slowing down, and Lurien every sign, they began to get worried. Ghost ran up alongside her and tugged at her dripping shawl.

“What?” She shouted down at them past the rain, squinting against the drops that flew into her face. When she looked down to see what they wanted, Ghost gestured back at Lurien, and Hornet followed their hand.

“Wyrm’s sake,” She cursed to see him straggling some twenty meters back, listing this way and that and gamely pressing on. “Fine. Go get him, I’ll find somewhere to rest.”

Ghost went back while she ventured on ahead, splashing through deep puddles back to Lurien’s side. He didn’t notice them for a few seconds, head bowed against the torrenting rain and seemingly focused entirely on making himself walk. Ghost hesitated, then reached out and tentatively took his hand.

Lurien didn’t even flinch at the cold press of their fingers, just tilted his head some to face them. “Oh, hello again,” He tried for cheerful, but it was a thin veneer at best. “Are we nearly there, Ghost?”

Ghost shook their head, which he wilted at, resembling nothing so much as a dejected lamppost, and they tugged at his hand until he followed them unsteadily.

It was going to take a little longer than anticipated to make it anywhere at all, Ghost thought as he crashed through puddles along behind them as they scanned ahead for Hornet. It wasn’t long until she came to find them, instead.

“Come on, there’s a shop with a fireplace not far ahead. No husks left, and the door locks.” She told them in thinly masked irritation. “We’ll take a brief rest and keep on.”

“Thank you,” Lurien gasped. “Are you normally so… Expedient?” He asked, hobbling along behind while Ghost walked at a sedate pace.

“No, usually we’d be halfway there by now.” Hornet informed him. “And we wouldn’t need to stop.”

Apparently, whatever brief benevolent madness had caused her to let him come along did not extend to caring for how he held up afterward. Ghost patted Lurien’s arm sympathetically as he winced at the insult. They wished he wouldn’t be so untried though, especially knowing how Hornet viewed those unable to fend for themselves.

It wasn’t his fault of course, but Ghost wasn’t entirely sure she wouldn’t cut him down for it if he kept on like this, in no small part because of how annoyed she was to be slowed down for no good reason. They wouldn’t allow it, and they only half-suspected Hornet to be considering it anyway, but they’d prefer it not come to that. They hoped, instead, that that particular inclination of hers was mostly geared towards Vessels, and something she was past by now, at that.

The shop Hornet showed them to was small, and might have been a restaurant of some sort at one point, as it was filled with little tables with a handful of chairs to each. Lurien collapsed into one, narrow limbs trembling with exertion and dripping water all over the floor, and dropped the longnail he’d somehow kept ahold of beside him.

Ghost shook the worst of the water off at the door, to Hornet’s half-hearted protest, and closed it behind them. Immediately the pounding of the rain deadened to a distant roar, and loudest now was the drip of moisture from their cloaks. They glanced over Lurien, who seemed content to stay put and catch his breath, and went to help Hornet with the fire.

“Go search through the cabinets for towels to dry off with, and grab something flammable we won’t miss to burn.” She instructed, occupied with setting a small scrap of dark fabric she might have torn from one of the ragged curtains ablaze.

Ghost nodded and padded off to search through the crowded kitchen. It was a close setup, only just large enough for them to walk through without difficulty, and most of the cabinets were higher than they could reach without climbing on a counter, so they started with the lower ones. Fortunately, one had a stack of dusty old towels, smelling strongly of mildew but dry enough. And tucked in the back corner of another was an old, crystalized little jar of something whitish gold.

The color alone was nearly enough to make Ghost leave it be, but it didn’t glow, and they wondered what it was. So they grabbed it along with their heaping armful of towels and carted the whole bounty back to the front of the shop.

Hornet had the fire started and grabbed the rattiest towel off of Ghost’s stack, which she mechanically tore to strips while Ghost set the little jar down and padded over to offer Lurien a larger one to dry off with.

“My thanks again, little one.” Lurien said, sounding somewhat recovered. He accepted the towel and first wiped clean his mask, and then set about dabbing at the moisture soaking his cloak.

“What are you doing that for?” Hornet called unkindly as she built up the fire. “Just take off the cloak to dry.”

Lurien recoiled. “What? Why in Wyrm’s great Kingdom would I do that?”

“Because it’s wet, and no one has cared an ounce for propriety for hundreds of years.” Hornet replied shortly, and as though to express how ridiculous she found him, took off her own sopping shawl and wrapped herself in one of the more intact towels to dry off.

Lurien looked away. “Thank you, I’ll be fine. Goodness, how long has it been that bugs remove their cloaks publicly?”

“I distinctly recall that most people didn’t wear anything at all.” Hornet replied flatly. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s not a matter of concealment, it’s a matter of respectability,” Lurien insisted. “It’s part of your identity, like your mask.”

“I sincerely doubt you could confuse me with any other bug that has ever lived.” Hornet intoned. “But by all means, keep your respectability and stay wet. Ghost, give me your cloak.”

Ghost peeled their soaked cloak from their chitin gratefully and handed it to her, and she hung it up alongside her shawl over the fire and passed them back another towel.

Then she noticed the jar they’d recovered, set on the ground beside her while Ghost had dealt with drying off. “Where did you find that?” Hornet asked, and there was a note of carefully suppressed hunger they’d never heard from her before.

Ghost, in the middle of toweling off the damp collected in the joints of their shell, indicated the kitchen with a nod, then tilted their head in question.

“It’s honey.” She told them and picked up the jar with careful claws. “I haven’t had honey since… No, it must have been since the Hive closed its borders. I wonder how some little shop in the City of Tears, of all places, hung onto a jar for so long.”

Hornet tapped the cap firmly against the metal grating around the fireplace, then wrested the lid free. She lifted it to her face and breathed deeply.

“The Hive has closed itself off?” Lurien asked quietly. “Has Hallownest any allies left?”

“Not since it burned all its bridges, no.” Hornet replied, distracted. “Ghost, did you see any pots or bowls in there?”

They had, and they draped their towel over their shoulders in a makeshift cloak to go and grab one, a wide cooking bowl that took both hands to carry back.

“Good, if you’d go fill it with water, I’ll make us something edible.” Hornet proclaimed, setting aside the jar and screwing the lid back on. “And I suppose I’ll share with you, or you might keel over before we get to the stag station,” Ghost heard Hornet address Lurien as they left their towel and stepped outside, holding the bowl up to catch the falling rain.

It only took a moment, and they stepped back inside to see Hornet had disappeared into the kitchen, and they heard the clatter of pans and a triumphant shout.

She emerged with an armful of dried, shriveled-looking roots and a second armful of tiny containers, each decorated with a painted symbol. Hornet set these down to the side of the fire, and accepted the overflowing bowl with an appreciative nod. She set it down on the flat grate over the fire, where Ghost imagined the shop must have cooked.

“This is wonderful, and I regret you won’t be able to taste it, Ghost,” Hornet told them as she braced her needle between her knees and began to use the edge to cut the wrinkled roots, slicing them roughly in half and then half again and setting them aside onto a plate she must have retrieved while Ghost was outside.

“Why won’t they?” Lurien asked, offended for them. He’d crept over to observe, and now knelt at a safe distance from Hornet’s needle and watched her cook.

“How did you become a Dreamer, if you know nothing of Vessels?” Hornet asked in unsurprised exasperation, and shoved half the pile of roots at him. “Here, make yourself useful and chop these up.”

Lurien picked one up gingerly between two claws. “I suppose I don’t know much of the mechanics of the Vessels, only their purpose. Why can’t they eat? And, are you sure these are safe?”

“No, I’m not, but I’m going to cook it until nothing survives.” Hornet informed him. “As for Vessels, I admit I have only recently discovered much of what I know. Little Ghost, tell me if I’ve taken any wrong impressions.”

Ghost was truthfully interested in what their observant sister had picked up by now, and sat cross-legged between the two to listen and nodded their acknowledgement.

“Alright. You don’t eat, yes?” Hornet half-asked them.

Ghost wobbled a hand horizontally in the air, to indicate that was partially true. Hornet looked alarmed, so they brought out a page of paper and their disintegrating pen and drew the glyph for ‘soul’.

“Ah. Hence the hot spring. I feel as though I should have known that before, but I’m glad I haven’t been starving you.” Hornet apologized.

Ghost shook their head hurriedly and gave her a few reassuring pats on the arm, which she accepted with a slightly embarrassed bobble of her head and turned back to preparing the roots.

“A creature that subsists off the soul of others… How uncanny.” Lurien commented, but not nastily.

Hornet shot him a burning glare regardless, and continued. “I’m not entirely certain on this one anymore, but you sleep less than most bugs, correct?” She addressed Ghost.

They weren’t sure how to tell her that the closest they naturally came to sleep was more of a trance, and so nodded.

“And, of course, you are born of Void.” She finished. “Without voice, if nothing else.”

Ghost nodded again. Without physical voice, definitely, to their eternal annoyance.

“Such a strange little thing. And they were supposed to contain the Infection? I suppose that must be one of the obscure qualities of void.” Lurien pondered. “Oh, so the Infection must have run its course then, if the little one isn’t in the Black Temple?”

Hornet stared at him as though trying to decide if he was honestly ignorant, or if he were inexplicably trying to pull a cruel joke on her. If she’d though he were, Ghost imagined she’d have probably killed him there, but she only looked away and began adding her neatly sliced roots and Lurien’s uneven segments to the heated water over the fire, just beginning to boil.

“No, the Infection is still very much unstopped. Didn’t you hear me when I said the Pale King’s plan failed? Still it reanimates the dead, and pulls the living into madness. No, there is yet a Vessel sealed in the Black Egg, and they have failed in their task.” Hornet said quietly.

Ghost had to restrain themself from leaping to the Hollow Knight’s defense, in whatever form that might have taken, and instead clenched their claws in the towel wrapped again around their shoulders. Hornet might look down on the Hollow Knight for their inability to contain the wrath of a vengeful god, something they never should have had to do, but that was because she didn’t _know_.

“Oh. You did… You did say there were many Vessels born.” Lurien said carefully. “So this is another of them? Why only one, where are the rest?”

Ghost thought of falling bodies and cracking masks and dripping, dissipating void, and their claws dug little tearing holes into the towel.

Hornet was quiet for a long time, staring into the boiling water. “Don’t ask questions whose answers you don’t wish to know.” She said evenly. “And don’t ever ask me that particular question again.”

She selected one of the myriad of little containers, that Ghost thought must be spices, and examined the front.

“Do you have any objection to pepperseed?” Hornet asked him casually even as she pulled off the top, gave it a quick sniff, and dumped half into the pot.

“I… Suppose not.” Lurien mumbled, thoroughly cowed. He shifted a little in his still-damp cloak, the towel he’d likewise draped over his narrow shoulders nearly as wet.

They spent a few minutes in the quiet, listening to the pot bubble, before Hornet made a frustrated noise and grabbed up the jar of honey.

She held it sideways over the pot so that the steam drifted up around it, turning it steadily for a minute or so, then took it off and opened it. Hornet dug a claw into the scarcely-decrystallized honey inside and, ignoring Lurien’s half-controlled hum of disapproval, popped it into her mouth and licked it clean.

“I’m keeping this,” She mumbled, and screwed the cap back on with some hesitation.

Lurien was savvy enough not to ask for a taste at least, to Ghost’s relief, as the atmosphere relaxed some. They reached around behind Hornet, irately stirring whatever was in the pot that was now releasing a pungent, spicy smell that made even Ghost’s eyes water, and grabbed him another towel, which Lurien accepted graciously and traded out for his own.

“I’m going to go get bowls,” Hornet announced and stood up abruptly, and disappeared into the kitchen.

The resulting clamor was probably excessive, but as Lurien and Ghost watched, bemused, she did come back with a bowl for each of them.

Hornet threw herself back down in front of the fire and dipped each bowl into the simmering pot, carefully scooping out roughly equal portions, with nearly half leftover. She handed Ghost theirs, which they accepted eagerly and held close, relishing in the warmth of the nearly too-hot bowl, and then passed over Lurien’s with a scowl.

Lurien took his bowl meekly and put it down in his lap just as fast, inconspicuously flicking his claws to cool them before using handfuls of towel to pick it back up. “Thank you, miss Hornet.” He said politely. “It is kind of you to share your food with me.”

“You were watching, it’s not mine.” Hornet shot back, unsoftened. “Don’t think me heartless; I wouldn’t leave one who hasn’t eaten in centuries to go hungry, no matter how annoyingly prodding I find their questions.” She said, filling her own bowl and holding it in her lap to cool.

“And don’t call me that. ‘Hornet’ is fine.” She rebuked.

“Of course, Hornet.” Lurien sounded out. “You said you were from the Hive?” He asked, courageously pressing on to revive the conversation.

“No. Now I really know you weren’t listening; I believe I introduced myself as of Deepnest.” Hornet replied stiffly.

“Yes, that you did, but one can be from many places.” Lurien defended reasonably.

“Well then, I am from Deepnest. Where are you from?” She shot back, clearly intending that as a conversation ender.

“Oh! Kind of you to ask, I’m from Dirtmouth, as it happens.” Lurien said happily.

In spite of herself, Hornet seemed grudgingly interested. “How did a Dirtmouth bug become the Watcher of the City of Tears?”

Ghost didn’t know exactly why that was an unusual thing, but the way Hornet had said so made them wonder as well, and they directed their full attention to Lurien’s answer.

“Oh, it wasn’t my doing, really,” Lurien demurred. “I was only a painter for a long time, and that’s all I wanted to be. I painted the King, once, and what a terrifying experience that was. But he is lovely to look upon, and glows so brightly, and I poured my soul into the work. He must have liked it, because the King gave me a place at the top of my tower to look down at all the detail of the City, and to continue my art.”

“The Pale King liked the painting of a common Dirtmouth bug so much he gave you a tower and a title.” Hornet repeated skeptically.

“Well, yes! I suppose so. And a job, as it happened. I was to keep watch over the City, and to report any disturbance. Not little disturbances mind you, big things. If the foot traffic avoided a certain street, or if an unusual amount of lights were on at all hours, or if the general flow of the City was disrupted in any way. I’ve an eye for detail, but also for the big picture. I focused on the macroscopic. The entire organism of the living, breathing City, not just the individual.”

“Hm. So that is what you did. Yes, that makes sense.” Hornet agreed.

“It does?” Lurien said in surprise.

“Yes. You were a very neat little manipulation indeed.” Hornet said, and there was a note of thoughtful viciousness in her voice that set Ghost on edge.

“Isolated and grateful, far from home and intrinsically aware of the magnitude of the situation as the Infection progressed. Of course you would develop something of an affection for the City of Tears as a whole, and from there the whole of Hallownest. Cut off from any dissent, given so much for so little. You’d be indebted, irreversibly so. You’d never be able to turn him down. And so well guarded! Easily protected with a simple bottleneck, with no reason to leave.” Hornet mused, watching Lurien as he sat, growing stiffer by the word until his hands clenched around his cooling bowl.

“Yes, what a carefully created Dreamer you made.” Hornet finished, the final nail in the coffin.

Ghost saw how Lurien stilled, and slowly began to shake his head side to side as if in horrified denial, and placed a hand on Hornet’s arm. When she looked down at them in surprise, they shook their own head firmly. That had been uncalled for, and Ghost needed to make her understand that.

“It’s true, that’s exactly how the Pale King operated. You know this better than anyone.” Hornet argued at them, but her voice wavered with a quiet note of uncertainty.

It didn’t matter if it was true. To so callously tell Lurien that his life and his sacrifice had been manipulated from the start, things that he cared deeply for and took pride in, was not necessary. Ghost stared at her, and tried to communicate without words that it would never have mattered even if Lurien had never known.

Lurien hiccupped quietly, drying cloak twitching with the distressed juddering of his shoulders. Hornet stared at Ghost, and then at him.

“Damn it all, you truly _are_ a terrible influence,” She cursed at them, and then, “Lurien, I’m sorry.” She spat out like the words burned her. “I shouldn’t have been so… Blatant.”

Hornet sighed, and cast a final weak glare at Ghost, and then her voice was more genuine. “I apologize. My words did not need to be said.”

“But you’re right, aren’t you?” Lurien sobbed, his voice high with despair. “You’re right, and I’ve been a loyal idiot my entire life. And now it’s truly gone, isn’t it?” It wasn’t a question, and Ghost thought he whispered it more to himself than to Hornet or them.

Lurien gave a wavering, incredulous inhale. “It was for nothing, wasn’t it? Nothing at all. I can’t even care if I was made to love the City, because I _did._ I cared so much, and I wasn’t even awake to help it while it died. And I suppose nothing I did asleep was enough. I wish I’d been there, at least.”

“No, I don’t think you do. Not in the City of Tears.” Hornet told him quietly.

Lurien made a choked sound, and gripped his bowl so tightly in his thin, unsteady hands that Ghost thought it would snap in two. “Was it… Bad?”

Hornet did not reply, only staring, expressionless, up at him as he shook and choked on half-swallowed tears.

The Watcher did not meet her gaze, only tilted his pale mask down to his lap and tried, and failed, to even his breathing. In the quiet of the dusty shop, with the faint rain brushing the roof above and the endless paved roads beyond, it seemed the only sound.

Was it better, or worse, Ghost wondered, unable to think of any way to comfort the Dreamer where he sat mourning all he had hoped to save, to know exactly who you had lost? How different was a city of people Lurien had known, at least in part, from their own endless lost siblings? Had Lurien had his own Hollow Knight that he’d hoped to save?

It was different, of course it was different, and yet. To be alone like that wasn’t something Ghost would wish on many, and the more Lurien spoke, the more they became certain they did not wish it on him.

“I always wondered why he would be so kind,” Lurien said finally. “To give me the space and quiet I dearly craved and the freedom to pursue all the art I wanted to create, but I never once grew suspicious. Was any choice my own? Have I ever done something important in my life truly of my own volition? Could I have _stopped it_?”

“It doesn’t matter if you have. What could one miserable recluse do against the Infection?” Hornet said sharply, eyes bright with... It wasn’t anger, but neither was it encouragement. Whatever spurred Hornet to speak, it was much older and deeper than that.

“The time for such regrets is centuries gone. I meant what I said before. You’ve been given a second chance to live, with which you may do whatever you please. There is no Pale King to taint that now. Go back to Dirtmouth, choose a house among the townsfolk, and survive! Paint if you want, or sculpt, or craft, or whatever will put food on your table. You have a kind of freedom that comes with having no other options, and a chance no others have been granted, so make them!” She told him.

Lurien cowered, taken aback by her outburst. Ghost felt equally taken aback, blindsided by her certainty as she stared Lurien down, daring him to deny the opportunity she’d spread before him. It was personal to her, Ghost realized, of course it was. Hornet’s mother was a Dreamer.

Would the Dream Nail work as they’d used it a second time? A third? It had to.

Lurien swallowed audibly, croaked something indistinguishable, cleared his throat, and tried again, voice thick with restrained tears. “I,” He swallowed again. “Alright. Okay, Hornet. I’ll try.”

“Good.” Hornet said, and then, in the ensuing pause, “Eat your soup.”

Lurien sniffled and raised his bowl, tilting his mask out of the way. Then he had to lower it quickly as he gave a violent series of coughs, raising his other arm to hack and splutter into his elbow.

“What’s in this?” He asked incredulously.

“Definitely pepperseed. I’m not entirely sure what the root was, but it tastes alright.” Hornet raised her own bowl and took a big mouthful, chewing at the chunks of tuber.

She swallowed and hummed thoughtfully. “Yes, they’d gone bad. But I think I’ve cooked them long enough that it shouldn’t matter. The taste is what the pepperseed is for.”

“I see.” Lurien said dubiously, and took a smaller sip.

Ghost saw his hands clench tight around his bowl, but he must have forced it down because he raised it for another. They were suddenly very glad they didn’t have to eat, and offered Hornet their cooling bowl.

“Thank you, Ghost, I’ll eat that in a minute.” Hornet acknowledged.

Ghost watched them sip at their bowls for a minute or so, but now that no one was talking there wasn’t much to pay attention to and they felt their awareness begin to wane. It was unlike them to want to rest so often, but then, it was unlike them to have the security to do so. They wondered, not for the first time, how they’d survived so long entirely alone.

Ghost scooted closer to Hornet’s side and leaned against her, and Hornet glanced down at them.

“Tired, little Ghost? Well, we’ll be here for a short time yet. Take a few minutes to rest.” She said.

They nodded and wedged themself close, and relaxed into the drone of the rain and the safety of the still little shop.

There were a few minutes of quiet slurping and Lurien making slightly disgusted sounds at the soup as they ate. Then Lurien put down his bowl with a soft thump in his lap.

“You really care for them, don’t you?” He said quietly.

“They’re my sibling. They’ve earned my trust a thousand times over.” Hornet replied.

“But you don’t seem like the sort of person to let anyone fall asleep on her.” Lurien said.

“I’m not,” Hornet agreed. “But I will begrudge them nothing of the sort. My sibling has been alone for a very long time, and that is in many ways my own fault. I, too, have been alone a very long time, and I find myself growing fond of the ability to touch another without bloodshed. Rarely do I crave reassurance as they do, but I don’t mind it.” She was quiet for a beat.

“And I’m only telling you this because I know they’re listening, and I want them to know. And, perhaps, because I have treated you wrongly. For Ghost’s sake, I’m sorry for it.”

Ghost _had_ been listening, and butted their mask into her side. Hornet freed a hand to pat them on the head, once, and then returned it to her bowl.

“Oh. I’m sorry, I thought they… Ah, they don’t sleep.” Lurien mumbled the last to himself. “I forgive you. It was the truth, though I’d have been glad not to hear it. You’re right, though. I can make of myself what I want from here, with no possible use to another except what I decide to give. I like that, I think.” He said, voice lilting like a smile.

“I’m gratified to hear so. Are you up to the rest of the trip?” Hornet asked.

“You know, I think I am. I hope so, at least. I think I was hungry.”

“Yes, that sounds about right. Finish your soup, and eat as much as you can. I made too much.”

Ghost zoned out from there as they talked about less interesting things, like soups and stew recipes and the relative merits of various spices, which gave Ghost the general impression that Hornet was a staunch defender of ‘spice it until you can’t taste the ingredients’ and Lurien, predictably, was firmly in the ‘too much of a good thing’ camp.

And then Hornet was shaking Ghost back to awareness with a hand on their shoulder. Ghost sat up, awake in an instant.

“Can you hold some supplies? I want to take some of these spices back with me, but I haven’t the space.” Hornet asked and, at their nod, began to hand them what seemed like every single little marked container she’d taken from the kitchen.

Ghost tucked each one away within their void, to rest near their other treasures, and looked up when Lurien gasped.

“Oh, what are they doing?” He asked.

“I’m not sure. It’s useful though, so I’m not going to complain.” Hornet said practically, and passed them a last box.

The honey, they noticed, was carefully tucked away in the little bag of necessities Hornet kept strapped securely to her side, where it barely fit. They’d have to get her some more somehow, Ghost decided.

In spite of her voracious appetite and her mostly willing help, Hornet hadn’t managed to eat all of the soup she made, which she grumbled about as they stepped back out into the pouring rain.

“It’s a shame there’s no way to save some,” Lurien said, sounding not at all like this was a bad thing.

Hornet glared at him without heat, and led the way out into the deluge.

True to expectation, Lurien proved to be a much better trooper this time. Ghost thought there was probably a moral there, but shrugged it off, grateful that he and Hornet had come to an uneasy agreement instead of blows.

He was still significantly slower than Ghost or Hornet on their worst days, but not enough to be a real hindrance, and though he looked exactly as much like a drowned lamppost as before, he was a drowned lamppost with a good meal and a rest, which made all the difference.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternate title might be "Hornet Bullies Lurien : The Chapter". Or maybe, "Hornet Speedruns Therapy And It Only Kinda Works".
> 
> So what was the culinary culture of Hallownest like? Probably difficult to translate to people food.  
> And could you imagine, sleeping for hundreds of years and some weird kids wake you up for no immediately apparent reason to shout at you about atrocities you didn't even know were a thing? Kids with swords, no less. If Lurien had had any ego, it might have taken a blow from that one. Honestly, no one ever tells Lurien anything.


	22. The Folk of Dirtmouth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dirtmouth has not been idle.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : None.

It was another few hours of walking in the miserable downpour before they arrived at the stag station, but it was tolerable, at least to Ghost. They did worry about Lurien when they hurried under the immense, towering overhang of King’s Station, and noticed that he was shivering badly.

Hornet noticed, too. “Wring out your cloak, if you won’t take it off. The less water you have up against your carapace, the less heat it will sap.”

Lurien nodded mutely and did so, taking up a heavy handful of fabric and squeezing out a short waterfall of rainwater.

“It’s warmer in the stagways, and we’ll be at Dirtmouth soon. You can dry off there.” Hornet told him in what she must have thought to be a reassuring tone.

Lurien gave a short laugh. “For my own sake, I hope so! How aren’t you frozen through?”

“A simple question, with a complicated answer,” Hornet replied mysteriously.

King’s Station, though Ghost supposed they’d been there once with Hornet, was entirely unfamiliar to them. It was huge, echoing as they walked through it and grand to behold. Though it was draped heavily in shadows and there was distant dripping echoing like slow footsteps from some corner unseen, it was clear that King’s Station had been a major thoroughfare for the City.

Hornet led them under massive, hanging banners half-rotted and stained dark with the endless water and still discernible to have had elaborate designs colored into their weave, and around hectic signposts with glyphs pointing every which way. They climbed to a second floor, and Ghost saw a third even above that. The place was solid, built to last, and in every corner were indications of use, fragments of the multitudes that had once passed through each day.

“It’s empty,” Lurien said, his voice hushed. “It’s so disconcerting, to see no one at all. I must have looked across the City and seen the King’s Station in the distance a hundred thousand times, and always there were bugs coming in and going out. It was the major travel hub of the entire City, the entire Kingdom, even.”

“It was.” Was all Hornet said.

Though there were countless stag stations to have chosen from, she led them across King’s Station to a particular one, selected seemingly at random.

“Why this station? Aren’t all stagways connected?” Lurien asked.

“They are, but this particular stag’s sense of direction I trust about as far as I could throw him. I thought I’d make his job easier, and come to the station he is familiar with.” Hornet said wryly.

“Why not take another stag?” Lurien pressed, sounding vaguely concerned.

“There are none. I didn’t even know of this one until little Ghost showed me.” Hornet explained.

“None...? How could there be none? I’ve been on the stagways maybe a handful of times, but I remember dozens at once, all lined up to take travelers, and that was at the storerooms.” Lurien insisted.

“That was a long time ago, now.” Hornet said simply, and rang the bell.

Ghost watched the stagway tunnel’s long-unused entrance as they heard distant galloping, and then the Stag burst from the archway and slowed to a stop in front of the landing. They dropped down the mold-slick stairwell to greet him as he lumbered in a half-circle and pushed his chin up and over the half-broken stone so Ghost could pat him hello.

“Little Ghost, it is good to see you once more. You had me terribly concerned, little one.” The Stag grumbled, tilting his head to regard them out of one concerned black eye, and Ghost patted at him apologetically.

“Oh, I didn’t know they would do that.” Lurien exclaimed. “Be on the platforms, I mean.”

Ghost gave him a look over their shoulder as the Stag rumbled a laugh.

“Ah, a new traveler! How you seem to bring them in force, little one. Soon there may be busy days on the stagways yet. And the King’s Station! It gladdens me to see it once more. Nearly I can hear the pounding of stags’ feet through the halls, and the murmur of the crowd. Rarely did I linger here long.”

“And hardly you’ll linger today. We need to go to Dirtmouth.” Hornet said.

“Are you truly the last stag?” Lurien asked.

The Stag gave a rough sigh that fluttered his beard. “Have you seen another, in all the bells you have rung, little one?”

Ghost shook their head regretfully.

“Then there are none. No living stag would ignore the call of the bell.” The Stag intoned lowly. He shifted his great head from the platform and crouched to let them board his broad back.

“So let the last of us do his duty while yet he can. To Dirtmouth?” He said.

“Yes, please.” Hornet replied and climbed gracefully up into his saddle.

“Hold on just a moment,” Lurien said, clambering up without any grace at all and pulling himself into the seat behind her. “Alright, I’m ready.”

Ghost rested a hand on the Stag’s armored side and tilted their head at him.

The Stag narrowed his closest eye, huge and reflective, hearteningly. “Worry not, little one. As long as I live, I am honored to take part in my work. And, little one, I believe I am remembering the way to the Stag Nest, where I was born.” The Stag lowered his voice, as though confiding in a treasured secret.

“My mind runs down the familiar paths, but my feet cannot find it again. But perhaps, if I run the breadth of the Kingdom once more, I will run home to it. It would do me good, and confirm, finally, if I truly am the last.”

“You do me a great service in traversing the stagways, little one. Pray do so just long enough so that I might recall the ways home.”

Ghost nodded firmly and gave his shell a final pat, and jumped up to take the seat next to Hornet, who scooted over to make room. It would be nice, they thought as the Stag lurched to his feet and careened into the dark, if someone could have a happy ending. Perhaps not all of Hallownest had gone dark in the long years.

The trip was less disorienting this time, now that they’d been on a ride or two and knew what to expect, and Ghost only needed to clench their claws around the seat barriers to keep their balance. They couldn’t imagine how tricky it must have been for Hornet to take the stagways without a free hand to hold on with, or without dropping Ghost entirely, and found themself abruptly grateful that their sister was ever solid on her feet and a master of her own equilibrium as the miles of the stagways fell away.

It did take longer than the other trips though, which Ghost attributed to how far the depths of the City of Tears were from the surface. It was humbling, to think of how deeply the bugs of Hallownest had delved to shape their Kingdom, and at once sparked excitement too.

As soon as this was all over, Ghost would explore every nook and cranny for no reason other than to know them. By sheer accident they’d already come across so many wonders, it was almost unbearably exhilarating to consider how many more still remained to be seen, tucked away and hidden in the shadows, where no bug had ventured for years and years. How much could be gleaned of the past from what was left?

What would they do with it?

How strange it felt, to hope so strongly. Maybe it was the relative ease with which they’d dealt with the first of the Dreamers, but Ghost felt emboldened. Like all they wanted, that they’d been so certain would cost them everything to obtain before, lay within reach. They’d, all going according to plan, rescue the Hollow Knight and then Hallownest and there would be no Infection, no terrible looming danger to warn bugs away from the Kingdom and kill them for daring its depths.

Hallownest would never be safe, but it would be livable once more for all who cared to try. Ghost and the Hollow Knight and Hornet could map the Kingdom end to end, enjoy every sight and sound together, and around them there could once again be people living their lives in this lonely place.

Of course there would be complications, but Ghost found it hard to care for the details, not when even that most idealized future was nebulous and unsettled, and so much could go wrong.

But maybe their good mood, as the Stag pulled up to the Dirtmouth station, was also in part excitement to see their friends again. Or at least those Ghost thought of as friends, however they might consider them back.

“Take care, little one.” The Stag called as they jumped down. “And tell those of this empty little town that the stagways run yet. I sense more overhead than there have been in a long time, and I look forward to meeting them.”

Ghost nodded to him as Hornet grumbled at Lurien for taking too long to climb down, and then as a group they took the creaky little lift up to the town.

Ghost noticed that the Dirtmouth stag station was much, much smaller than those belowground, and far less distant. There was a corkboard on one wall of a room just big enough to hold Hornet and Lurien and them without feeling crowded, and the board was cluttered with faded and tattered papers pinned one atop the other, bearing reminders and notices and little drawings that might have been enticements to attend a show or event.

It felt, for all the dust and dry rot, like someone might step inside and pin another, or scrutinize a page for the information to an upcoming deadline.

Ghost didn’t think Hallownest was as dead as Hornet did.

And stepping out into Dirtmouth’s center only affirmed their belief. Though the wind still blew cold and bitter and clouded with dust off the mountains beyond, the empty little town wasn’t so empty anymore. There was Iselda and Cornifer’s shop, of course, squat and round-walled to keep the wind from catching and the inside warm and welcoming, with their lights bright behind the dusty windows. Ghost could already see Elderbug, standing outside still and waiting for travelers.

But the dozens of empty houses had become a little fuller. Ghost could see three on first glance, at least, that had equally bright lights illuminating their windows that they were sure had been dark and abandoned when they’d last passed through. Ghost remembered how they’d left last in a tearful rush they were a little embarrassed of, but leaving behind a quartet of uninfected miner beetles, nonetheless. They hoped they’d get the chance to say hello.

Had they all individually taken up houses? Ghost would have guessed that they were family, and not on bad terms. Maybe Hallownest bugs chose housing differently than they’d expected.

Of course, the other option was much better; that more people had escaped the influence of the Infection below, or else arrived from beyond the closed gates at Hallownest’s border. Not closed anymore, Ghost thought with pride. They’d taken care of that on their own way in.

But they’d thought enough, and there was important business to attend to.

Ghost ran past Lurien, shivering in the cold and the wind and still miserably wet, and Hornet, who shouted after them unenthusiastically to be careful, and trotted up to Elderbug, who exclaimed to see them.

“Oh, hello, traveler! It’s been some time, I hardly expected to see you again. You make a welcome sight. And unless my old eyes are playing tricks on me, you’ve come from the stag station. I never thought I’d see such a thing.” He told them, shaking his head in disbelief.

“It seems you were a good omen, then. Now this faded town has some life to it, and the stag station too!” He repeated in wonder. “I’d nearly think the ruins were occupied once more, though they’ve lain empty since long before I came along. Much has happened, many exciting things since you left down the well. Why, our shopkeep’s wandered back in just the other day, led home by those good mining folk. And that lovely lass I thought we’d seen the sad last of returned to us the very same way.”

“Oh, and she seemed quite taken with the youngest of them. Sweet bug, that Myla, I don’t blame dear Bretta at all for her youthful passion. They’d make a lovely couple, and goodness knows this town needs more happiness.” Elderbug told them with an indulgent chuckle.

Ghost nodded enthusiastically, pleased to hear that everyone was getting on so well, and then heard Hornet calling for them over the rush of the wind.

So they waved goodbye to Elderbug, who smiled and waved back as they jogged back to find her.

Hornet, as it happened, they found inside one of the newly occupied (or reoccupied) houses. They walked in to find her in a heated argument with a fly who must have been the shopkeep, for around him was just about anything Ghost could think to want for any reason, and much more than that that they couldn’t think of a reason at all for.

“And I told you, I am not paying that much for a scrap of dried grass!” Hornet exclaimed, slamming her hands down on the counter.

To his credit, the fly seemed undeterred. “Unless you want to go out and collect your own kindling, my prices are set. Pay up or get out.”

Hornet made a frustrated noise and glanced back at Ghost.

“How much geo do you have? We need a few things, and so does this one.” She indicated Lurien, who jumped like a skittish tiktik.

“Really, Hornet, I don’t need anything at all. I’ll be fine, there are plenty of empty houses, and I’m sure I’ll get by. I’ve lived here before, you know.” He pointed out weakly.

“You lived here when this was a town instead of a free-for-all dustbowl. I’m buying you food and something to keep warm with.” Hornet shot back.

“Listen to your bothersome friend, tall one.” The fly encouraged.

Hornet glared at him, eyes burning with distaste. “Fifty.”

“One-hundred fifty.”

“Seventy-five.”

“One-hundred fifty.”

“A scrap of flint and a handful of kindling is _not_ worth one-hundred and fifty geo!” Hornet burst out.

“It is when there’s no influx, spider. My shop is what it is, and I’m not venturing back into the ruins for more.” The fly told her emphatically. “Nearly lost my head down there last time, and that’s maybe the only thing worth more than geo.”

“Stingy cretin. Fine, one-hundred fifty, as long as you throw in that blanket.”

“Gladly, if you pay an extra two-hundred.”

Ghost padded up to the counter and reached up to lay a few geo down. And then a few more, and a few more.

“Your little friend here gets it.” The fly said appreciatively.

Hornet gave an irritated sigh, and slapped her own geo down on the counter.

“Flint, kindling, the blanket, whatever food you have for sale, and a pot to cook it in. Do you want anything, little Ghost? He might as well give it to you, since you’ve parted with enough geo to buy his shop twice over.” Hornet said.

“That’s not necessarily true,” The shopkeep said hurriedly as Ghost scanned the shelves. “I’ve got quite a few rarer items in the back room, if I ever find the key.”

“Just break down the door.” Hornet advised.

Ghost pointed up to a shelf, where something was gleaming amidst some old careworn supplies, and then to a higher one where something else was lit in more color than they’d seen in one place in a long time.

“Eh? Oh, good eye, little one.” The fly buzzed his tiny wings and zipped up to retrieve first one, then the second item Ghost had indicated. He set them carefully on the counter, and Ghost craned up as tall as they could to see it.

One was a little sculpture done in glass and detailed in glinting, bright silver metal, of a moth in flight. Its wings shone in even the low light of the single lumafly overhead, refracting the white light into glints and spectrums. It was beautiful, and excepting where one of the antennae had snapped off at some point, surprisingly whole. Ghost grasped for it to look closer, but the fly scooted it just out of reach.

“That one’s gonna cost you. I’d forgotten I had this piece, it must be-“

“It must be from the moth tribes long gone,” Hornet finished for him. “And it _must_ be less than what they’ve paid for.” She threatened, shifting so her needle caught the light.

“…Fine. But only because you’re buying so much at once, and I’m not ungenerous to loyal customers. This other curiosity, however, you will have to pay some more for. This is a full intact set of watercolors, not that I expect you to know what that is.”

“Watercolors? Oh, I’m excellent with watercolor.” Lurien piped up from near the ceiling, where he was uncomfortably bent over in the shallow-roofed room. “I rarely use anything else. What manner of watercolors are they?”

“Ah,” The fly stammered. “Well. The good kind.”

Ghost had already deposited half again as much geo onto the counter.

“That’s enough, Ghost, or I’ll really need to make him part with his entire store.” Hornet stopped them.

“That won’t be necessary, in fact, I think this will do just fine.” The fly said, scooping the geo into a bin behind the counter. “Take the things, they’re yours. I’ll have the food packed up shortly, whatever’s left of it.”

Ghost jumped up and grabbed the moth in careful claws, and Lurien picked up the paints reverently.

“My, these are good quality. You’ll make beautiful things with them, Ghost.” Lurien said and offered the paint set to them.

Ghost shook their head and pointed back up at him. Even if they’d had the time to spend learning to paint, they’d much rather see what Lurien would do with it. They thought it might get boring, up here in Dirtmouth without much to do, and what better to do with so much free time than pursue something one loved?

“Do you want me to paint you something?” Lurien asked, though his claws tightened hopefully around the paints.

Ghost shrugged, and accepted the pack of essentials Hornet handed them while Lurien blustered for a better answer.

“Don’t put that away, it’s for Lurien.” She instructed, and set another on top of it before picking up the largest to carry herself.

“Please, let me help,” Lurien fretted, getting twitchier by the moment.

“Carry what Ghost got you and go ahead to pick out a house. Get one that goes higher than this, you’re too tall for something this size.” Hornet told him shortly and brushed past them to march outside.

Ghost followed her out, and was immediately set upon by Myla.

“Oh, my friend! I’m so glad to s-see you!” She said excitedly, bouncing in place.

“Here, let me carry some of that. Where are you going?” Myla asked, picking up the topmost pack with ease.

“I’ll let you know when we do.” Hornet said flatly from just down the path, where apparently Myla had brushed right by her in her excitement. “Who might you be?”

Myla laughed nervously. “Ah, my name is Myla, ma’am. The kind traveler is my friend, they saved me and my f-family from the plague below.”

She brightened and wheeled back to Ghost. “Oh, I’ve told them so m-much about you! And they’ve told me just as many things, about how you got a d-dozen crystal hunters without a scratch! We’re all so grateful, it would be w-wonderful to have you over for an evening!” Myla entreated.

Ghost shook their head unhappily, and Hornet backed them up. “We need to move quickly. Truly, we’re only stopping in Dirtmouth to resupply.” She said quickly as Myla began to wilt. “Though if Ghost would like to stop by while I deal with Lurien, that is their prerogative.”

Ghost brightened and nodded fervently, and Myla gave an excited little squeak and jumped in place.

“Hm. Don’t take too long. Give me that,” Hornet said and balanced first Ghost’s and then Myla’s bundles on top of her own, and strode off in the direction of some of the larger houses.

Ghost thought she walked a little faster than strictly necessary, but their sister, they knew, was not one for small talk, and less for sitting around without an express need to do so.

Myla, freed of her obligation to be helpful, grabbed up Ghost’s hand. “Come on, we live over here!” She said, and led them to a house just down the road, not especially tall but with a much wider floorplan than many of the rest.

Ghost imagined they’d need it, if all four of them lived there. And sure enough, when Myla opened the door and led them inside, three other beetles looked up.

“Little adventurer, how good to see you!” The father exclaimed. He put down his tools and what looked like a geo half-encased in stone and rose to greet them, closely followed by Myla’s siblings. “Why, you left so quickly last time we half-thought we’d been led home by a ghost! And without even a chance to thank you for your kindness.” He told them

“Kind Elderbug told us about the plague, and how rarely travelers come back up from the well.” Myla’s sister said. “We were worried we’d never get to thank you at all.”

“You made fun of me for days for being worried!” Myla’s other sibling complained.

“No I didn’t, I made fun of you for being a wuss about it. Plenty of people go down and get themselves killed.” Myla’s sister shot back.

“You w-were worried too, though.” Myla pointed out.

“No I wasn’t! I was very stoic.”

“You cried like, twice.” Myla’s sibling piled on gleefully.

“I didn’t!”

“You sort of did.”

“I’ve never cried in my life; I’m a worldly bug and I’ve seen things that would make your guts curdle.” Myla’s sister proclaimed.

“Except for last week, when you realized you forgot your favorite charm.” Myla’s sibling said dubiously.

“And yesterday, w-when you broke a c-claw in the doorjamb.” Myla offered.

“And this morning, when you were chewing out Bretta for her crush and Myla told you to knock it off.” Myla’s sibling added, while Myla shushed them hurriedly and closed the door behind Ghost.

“Don’t say that s-so loud! That’s not true.” Myla whispered loudly.

“What part? She really did cry.” Myla’s sibling replied.

“No, I _didn’t_!” Myla’s sister insisted.

“Bretta doesn’t have a c-c-crush on me,” Myla fretted. “She’s just grateful.”

“Myla, sweetheart,” Her father said with the greatest affection. “You’re being ridiculous.”

“Yeah,” Myla’s sister said, leaping at the chance to turn the focus of the conversation away from herself. “Yeah, she’s absolutely smitten. You just have to go out there and tell her you like her too! I could even do it for you!”

“I can’t do that! You especially c-can’t do that! What if I’m w-wrong? It’s not like we can m-move away. I’d need to t-take up a n-nail. I’d need to leave t-town and start a new life. I can’t do that! I don’t know h-how to fight!” Myla exclaimed anxiously.

Ghost reached up and patted her arm reassuringly, and Myla jumped, apparently having forgotten they were there.

“Oh, goodness, I can’t believe I’ve been so r-rude.” Myla said, visibly calming herself down. “Come sit down, we’ve hardly let you t-talk at all.”

She led them to the little table they’d all been clustered around doing their work, and motioned for them to sit down, which they did, while she left for one of the adjoining rooms.

Myla’s sister sat down next to them. “I don’t think we ever actually introduced ourselves, adventurer. So, hello. My name’s-“

“Why do you get to tell them your name first?” Myla’s other sibling said. “I’m the oldest.”

“By _maybe_ half an hour,” Myla’s sister shot back.

“I believe it was almost exactly forty-five minutes.” Their father reminisced, sitting down nearby and picking his tools back up. “But you cracked your egg first, dear.”

Myla’s sister hummed, mollified, and instead of introducing herself at all turned to Ghost with excitement. “So what’s your name?” She asked, her big black eyes curious and reflecting of the lumafly light overhead, and closer to Ghost’s face than they’d have preferred.

Ghost was well-versed in unusual mannerisms and only tilted their head some, then shook it.

“You don’t have a name?” Myla’s sibling gasped.

Ghost shook their head hurriedly, then changed their mind and nodded just as fast.

“So you _do_ have a name, which is…?”

Oh, if only it were that easy. Ghost brought out one of their last sheets of paper and their pen and ink once more.

“See, I told you I saw them do that!” Myla’s sibling exclaimed, shoving their sister hard enough to make her nearly fall over, which she responded to in kind.

“Yeah, and it made no sense, so I thought you made it up.” She defended tersely. “It still makes no sense.”

Ghost ignored them and carefully penned one of the glyphs Hornet had taught them.

“’Ghost’? Is that your name?” Their father asked, reading aloud. “Your handwriting has gotten much better, good job, grub.” He added.

Ghost bobbed their head in thanks, and again to confirm, and listened to the miner bugs bicker. It wasn’t nearly as lonely as the first time around, and Ghost found there was no bite of wistful longing in their chest to see them all happy and together. Ghost had everything they’d wanted, they realized, and only to cross the final barriers to make it all come together. It had always been family they’d missed, even when they couldn’t remember it.

They’d been so lonely, and they’d hardly known until they weren’t anymore.

So they settled in and listened to the miner bugs jabber on about this and that, and when Myla came back with a cup of tea for each of them they accepted it gladly. Ghost wondered, as they watched the family tease and laugh with each other, if they’d like to be neighbors. They _were_ friends, Myla had said as much, and the memory of her honest excitement to see them warmed them as much as the heated drink in their hands.

Ghost and their siblings could pick out a house and clean it up and make it their own, and never sleep out in the cold or worried about ambush again. That, too, filled Ghost with so much warmth that they felt their void was like to burst from their shell, swirling and swelled with happiness.

It took longer than they’d anticipated for Hornet to find them, their tea gone lukewarm in their hands as Myla’s sister launched into a recent tale of Bretta’s attempt and subsequent miserable failure to convince Myla of her ardor.

“And she had this _huge_ -“ The miner bug was saying with enthusiasm, gesticulating wildly to indicate impractical size as Myla hid her face in her hands, when Hornet threw open the door with a crash of rusted hinges.

“There you are, I’ve been calling you for ages.” Hornet said calmly, as though she hadn’t startled Myla’s sibling into fumbling their tea and made Myla squeak with alarm.

Ghost wasn’t surprised that they hadn’t heard her, the miner bugs weren’t a quiet lot, they thought with fondness. And Hornet must have been worried to start opening random doors in the hopes they’d be behind one, for all that she probably could have asked any Dirtmouth resident which house belonged to the miners.

“Lurien has finally picked out a house, and we cleaned it up some. He need not die for at least a month unless he does something very stupid.” Hornet said, with something Ghost might have generously called concern. “Are you running out of paper?”

Ghost stuck a hand inside their chest and rifled around under their cloak, and came up with distressingly few pages. They nodded and set down their tea.

“Oh, do you need to g-go?” Myla said in disappointment. “Be sure to come back soon!”

The sentiment was echoed by her family as Ghost stood up and waved goodbye, and followed Hornet out.

Hornet closed the door behind them, and appraised Ghost with mild surprise. “I was aware you did them a favor, but I didn’t know you were close. I’m glad. We’re all too suspicious these days.” She decided as they walked back to Iselda’s shop.

Ghost thought that the bugs they’d met were some of the least suspicious they’d ever encountered, thought the detail behind that judgement remained fuzzy as all their other memories from before Hallownest. This was with the notable exception of Hornet herself, who was maybe the single most fractious and mistrustful person they’d ever met. But if she thought herself included in that blanket statement, perhaps there was hope for their proud, stubborn sister yet.

Though, it wasn’t as if she weren’t owed her mistrust.

Ghost reached out and tapped her hand, and was warmed through when she didn’t even twitch, only opened her claws and accepted theirs into it, tightening them around Ghost’s own.

“Yes, yes,” She grumbled. “Me, too, I suppose.”

Iselda’s shop was open, and when Ghost and Hornet made their way inside Iselda herself was leaned over the counter, idly drumming her claws on its surface. She glanced up as they entered, and sighed like they weren’t who she’d rather see. Ghost, who hadn’t come across Cornifer recently, thought that was probably true.

“Hello, there.” She greeted. “Come for a map?”

Iselda blinked and looked down, and only then seemed to recognize them. “Well, hello again, I should say. Come for some more mapmaking supplies? You were so intent on the paper – oh.”

Ghost had let go of Hornet’s hand to set their mostly-destroyed pen up on the counter, along with about as much geo as it’d cost last time preemptively set alongside it.

“What below the earth have you done to the thing? It’s worn to bits.” She said with a short, incredulous laugh.

“We would like a stack of paper, as well. As much as you can spare.” Hornet said briskly, fishing through her little bag for a handful of geo.

“Not to be rude, but I honestly don’t think you could carry all the spare paper we have.” Iselda told her, propping up her chin in a hand over the counter. “Cornifer _is_ a cartographer.”

“A hundred pages, then.” Hornet amended.

“Sure. Do you have the geo for it?”

Ghost nodded and handed her another fistful.

“Where are you getting it all?” Hornet said, eyeing them with mild alarm. “I can’t imagine you’ve found that just lying around.”

To be fair, Ghost wasn’t sure either. They liked to pick up and hoard whatever interesting tidbits they found, and so they’d grabbed every shiny little geo they’d come across. The sheer volume that amounted to was startling even to them, but not unappreciated when it got them what they wanted so easily. Perhaps there was something to this geo business, after all.

“Keen eyes, closer to the ground.” Iselda said sagely. “All the children I’ve met are the same.”

Ghost crossed their arms irately.

“We,” Hornet began, and then thought better of it. “Yes, I imagine so. Right, little Ghost?” She looked down at them with teasingly narrowed eyes.

Ghost thought that was no way to treat one who was paying for most of this adventure, and pretended they hadn’t noticed.

“Is there a particular pen you want, grub?” Iselda chuckled. “I’ve got a few smaller sets with matching ink wells in the back.”

Oh, they were lucky they couldn’t hear what Ghost had to say. The only thing to do was to be the bigger bug.

Ghost tilted their head in question, and Iselda, still chortling, brought out a handful of blessedly ordinary-sized pens, which were interesting enough that Ghost decided to forgive them. Among the feathered quills of the kind she’d given them before were a handful of carefully wrought metal pens, shining and patterned. One was shaped like a stylistic feather itself, another like a diving wasp, yet another made of complementing spirals set into a comfortable handhold, and so on.

“I guess I can offer you a few nicer ones, since I’m sure you won’t go off and die down there. Hallownest is a ghastly, dangerous place, after all.” Iselda commented. “These are from my personal collection, but you seem like you’d need something a little sturdier than a quill. Go on, pick one.”

“Hm. Pretty.” Hornet commented, sounding begrudgingly impressed. She picked up the one shaped as a wasp, angling it so that it reflected the light.

“I don’t think I caught your name?” Iselda prompted gently.

Hornet looked up sharply, apparently taken off guard. “I am,” She began again, then shook her head a little and tried again. “My name is Hornet. It’s nice to meet you.” The words came out stilted and unpracticed, but Iselda hummed pleasantly anyway.

“Well, Hornet, it’s always nice to see a new face, however many we’ve been getting in this dreary little town recently. Corny and I must have gotten here just before the rush, and the company has me wondering if I’m so eager to see the last of this place after all!” Iselda laughed. “Wonderful people, if a little superstitious. Going on about some madness in the air below, every chance they get. Are all Hallownest bugs so odd?”

Hornet stiffened and turned half away. “There is no superstition. The ruin of Hallownest is a haunted, dangerous place, and if you would underestimate it I would suggest you let it lie.”

“You’re not serious?” Iselda asked doubtfully.

“Deathly.” Horned deadpanned. She set the pen down with care.

Iselda was quiet for a moment, studying her face. “Well, what is it then? A cult? A poison? A plague?”

“An Infection of the dream. It doesn’t yet extend so far above ground, but be wary of venturing deeper. It has claimed the lives of most.” Hornet warned. “Does your… ‘Corny,’ know of it?” She asked, stumbling over Cornifer’s name.

“Cornifer? No, no I don’t think so. At least, he’s never told me anything of the sort.” Iselda said with alarm. “A plague, huh. The passionate fool, to tear off into a set of ruins without knowing the first thing about them.” Iselda mumbled. “It’s deadly, I imagine?” She asked grimly.

“Over time. I don’t mean to frighten you,” Hornet said uncomfortably.

“How much time?” Iselda pressed.

“Weeks to months to years. There is little about it that is paralleled in two individuals, at least in time frame.” Hornet relayed.

“And I suppose you’d be the one to know,” Iselda laughed humorlessly. “You seem like you have some experience.”

“Yes,” Hornet said quietly. “Yes, I do. Little Ghost, do you have everything you need?” She asked suddenly.

Ghost nodded, having packed away their paper and a metal pen, simple and sleek and studded in places with tiny brass butterflies, but she was already striding out of the shop. Ghost made to follow her, but was stopped by Iselda calling their name.

“Little Ghost, hm? It fits you. Little Ghost, if you see my husband in those damned ruins, tell him he has to come back or I’m coming in after him. I mean it. He’s lucky it’s not been very long that he’s running about down there, or I’d go hunt him down right now.” Iselda promised, face set in a grimace. “Though I’d really rather not.”

Ghost tilted their head in acceptance, and she sighed in relief. “Good, good. You know, you seem so much livelier than last you were in my shop. Whatever happened, I’m happy for you.” She said with a small smile. “Now, go catch up to your sister, little one.” Iselda told them, making shooing motions with the hand not propped on the counter.

Ghost spared a moment to be puzzled, that they’d changed so much that someone who had spoken to them only a handful of times would take notice, and only nodded again before running after Hornet.

When they caught up to her she was already at the open, ill-used door to the Dirtmouth stag station, and glanced up distractedly when they approached.

“There you are, let’s go. I want to get through as much of the Crossroads as we can today. The Fog Canyon isn’t more than a few days’ walk from where we stand, so if we’re fast, we should make it there in good time coming from the Crossroads’ stag station.” She said as they stepped inside and rode the short lift down to the boarding platform, where the Stag was waiting patiently.

“Back so soon, little ones? Not stopping to take a rest?” The Stag asked.

“No, I don’t think I could handle any more resting.” Hornet said shortly. “We’re going to the Crossroads, or Queen’s Station if you know the way.”

“I’m afraid that even in the height of my service, Queen’s Station was a rare stop.” The Stag said apologetically. “But the ways to the Crossroads are as clear in my mind as the path before me.”

“Acceptable.” Hornet said, unsurprised. She climbed onto his saddle, and Ghost followed close behind, and they were off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little taste of what waits for them at the end of it all, should everything go better than to plan. I did say this was technically a fix-it fic, and really, out of everyone Ghost is having the worst time. They're in for much worse before it's all over, but there is light at the end of the tunnel! I AM capable of writing something wholly happy! 
> 
> My apologies that this set of chapters is up a little later than usual, but in my defense it isn't tomorrow until I sleep.


	23. Cause and Effect

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Hollow Knight weakens.
> 
> Chapter Warnings!!! : Extended description of a BAD panic attack, unintentional self-harm connected to the panic attack, angst.
> 
> If you never pay much mind to the warnings, please do so now if you think you should.

Immediately, once the Stag cleared the final turn into the Crossroads station, there was something terribly wrong.

“Oh, no.” Hornet breathed in horror, and Ghost could only regret they couldn’t do the same.

Without warning she vaulted from the Stag’s saddle and leapt into the air. In an instant her needle was in her hand, and she darted out of the crumbling entrance, glowing threateningly with a dull orange light. Ghost dashed after her as quickly as they could, barely slowing down to turn corners, following the red flash of her shawl as it fled through the twisting corridor and out into a main cavern, where dozens of roads through the Crossroads branched off and led to all the dark crannies of Hallownest, branching and branching again until they reached its furthest corners.

Or, they had been dark before. Now they were hauntingly lit with what, at first glance, Ghost took for dripping, clinging, swelling fire.

It was hot, swelteringly so, in a way not even the immutable stone of the towering, roughly hewn or often untouched caverns could take away. The Crossroads was bright, and in a way, it _was_ burning. As far as Ghost could see across its open caverns it was oozing putrid pustules of Infection, burning bright and golden orange that felt like it should be too intense to see, like the sun high above on a fiercely hot day. It was everywhere, swollen, twitching masses glowing like fever and filled with congealed orange plague that deepened nearly to sunset red at its most concentrated, blazing intensity.

It was just as the Infection had appeared in every ailing, maddened creature Ghost had slain, like the viscera of hundreds, thousands of great swollen beasts were spilled and spattered with perfect, virulent care over the world.

Ghost finally understood why the Hollow Knight had tried so very, very hard to hold on so tightly to that miasmic god.

Hornet gave a ragged inhale where she’d also stopped to comprehend what they were witnessing and, with a fast glint of her needle like the shine of moving glass before a flame, jabbed at a glob of it, sitting sessile and overwhelming in her path. It burst harmlessly apart, but the drips it parted into around her weapon settled themselves on the floor and didn’t fade.

And that was why it all felt so horrifying; the Infection didn’t fade. It wasn’t caught growing inside a mindless creature, it didn’t need that any more. It had slid just a tendril, only a fragment of its will, through that long-awaited crack in the Hollow Knight. And it was everywhere.

“I’ve never seen this,” Hornet said aloud. She gave a harsh, disbelieving huff of a breath, and then stood straight and changed the angle of her proud mask and looked back at Ghost, trying desperately to fight down their wrenching worry for their sealed sibling and for the kingdom their sister loved.

The worry had to wait, Ghost thought. Hornet was right, she’d always been right about this, everything fell behind the priority to stop _this_.

Hornet’s eyes were gleaming hotly in the fever-heat and uncanny light, and narrowed like slits of merciless void, their depths cold and determined, and she looked like nothing but Hallownest’s fearsome Protector.

“We are going to Fog Canyon, and there we will destroy the second seal.” She told them. “The Hollow Knight cannot hold. We cannot stop.”

Ghost grasped for their nail and held it at their side. Hornet nodded in satisfaction.

They moved much faster than they had traveled with Lurien, and even quicker than they’d covered ground before him. It helped that the Crossroads was mostly paved roads and even ground, intended for use by countless travelers. It proved to be an incredible advantage, and with Hornet darting overhead and Ghost leaping and dashing beneath, so light on their feet they hardly seemed to touch the ground before launching into their next bounding jump, the miles and hours fled before them as the tunnels twisted, almost unrecognizable under a living layer of illness.

But while Ghost could carry on almost indefinitely, so long as they stopped to hunt every once in a while and take a quick moment to rejuvenate their form and rest, Hornet, they knew, could not.

And when she stumbled into the path of one of the volatile, swelled beasts, something that squawked like it had once been a vengefly but had the speed and inertia of something far deadlier and far more confident in its claws, Ghost started to get worried.

They both only just staggered away from its twitching corpse, killed before it could do more than screech at them, before it exploded violently, splattering the walls and the siblings with its hot, steaming gore that Ghost was distinctly glad to see fade like it always had.

Hornet made a pained hiss and scraped at the stuff where it had fallen onto her mask. “It’s hot,” She warned, voice steady even as she flung the rapidly-dimming viscera away with force. “Maybe corrosive. Don’t touch it.”

Ghost had only noticed the heat, unsensitive to pain from temperature, but nodded regardless. They tilted their head at her and took a step closer.

Hornet took a step back.

“I’m fine, leave it.” She warned. “We’ll move a little slower so that we aren’t taken by surprise again.” She decided, and that was as close to a concession as Ghost thought they’d get.

They didn’t slow down much, but it was enough for anxiety to begin to mount within them. Ghost felt their void jitter with fear, and wondered why.

The Infection wasn’t something they were afraid of. They despised it, to be sure, and they were wary of it for Hornet’s sake, and it represented the endangering of the entirety of the new life they’d begun to build the framework of, but it wasn’t frightening. Powerful, dangerous, sickening and too-familiar, recalling how the Hollow Knight had felt it curl and slide slickly, forcefully, like liquid under intense, unyielding pressure within their chest, burning hot to the point of hurting even a child of the Void. But not scary.

So why, then, was Ghost suddenly terrified? Their instinct was to look to Hornet, but Hornet wouldn’t look back, focused on the path ahead and with cold determination in every clean, unhesitating kill she made, her needle slick with Infection and the remnants of husks and bugs alike.

She had withdrawn, and Ghost couldn’t blame her. Where they were quickly finding themself needing to press their claws against their chest to remain focused on their task, the pressure and little prickles working to keep their gaze fixed ahead and aware for the hissing, ravening infected bugs that had, in the overwhelming presence of the Infection around, become ferocious where they had been feckless and fatal where they’d been formidable, Hornet had likewise become steel and silk, faster and deadlier than anything they might face even here.

She had survived an age alone in Hallownest, protecting it from those who would seek to defile it and dually protecting herself from the dangers the ruins would carelessly cut her down with, should she lower her guard for exactly the wrong moment.

So why did seeing her grim and determined and in her element, coldly and efficiently wielding her needle like an extension of her soul, terrify them beyond reason?

They weren’t scared of her. Never, Ghost thought, never. They loved her too dearly to be afraid of anything she might do, especially trusting that she would always have a good reason. Their sister was a good person, and an ultimately kind one, in spite of everything and in spite of what she thought herself.

So why?

Their answer came when they finally faltered, their vision hazing over for just a moment, and only a moment too long. As it came back Ghost saw there was a husk before them, lunging with a terrible rasping cry like its throat had rotted away but its mindless fury was too potent to contain. Ghost’s nail wouldn’t be fast enough to cut it down.

And then Hornet’s needle was through the husk’s head with a thick, wet noise of giving chitin and congealed Infection, and it fell heavily at their feet.

“Try not to make protecting you so difficult, Ghost.” Hornet told them sternly, uncaring or unaware of how their body was steadily refusing to respond to their command, and leapt ahead. Away.

Oh. Of course.

The last time their sibling had gone distant and distracted, they’d lost them. And then Ghost had lost themself.

They still didn’t remember what had happened in between falling and finding their way, terrified out of their mind and more than halfway to breaking utterly, to Deepnest and Hornet. Ghost sincerely, desperately hoped that they’d never have to, something cold and dreading weighing in their void at the thought.

But there was no time for Hornet to reassure them for something so unimportant as their own half-remembered anxieties. Ghost felt sick with guilt even considering it, when the bounds of the Infection’s spread could have been anywhere, when the Hollow Knight, for all their endless effort, was finally crumbling beneath it. It wasn’t entirely escaped, though it had come into the world with furious force; Ghost was sure the Hollow Knight would have called out, in that case. Wouldn’t they?

Ghost took a step and stumbled, their vision going unsteady and their limbs shaking, void rebelling wildly, thrashing in near-panic.

They couldn’t falter. There was work to be done, and Ghost _knew_ they were better than this. They had faced down so much without a flinch, escaped so many battles without a scratch. Why were they brought to their knees _now_ , of all possible times? They’d been fine, not minutes ago, why _now_? Guilt rose choking in their throat, blurred their vision.

And now Hornet was gone, they realized in trying to shake it away.

She was nowhere to be seen, she’d jumped down a broken path and disappeared. Their void gave a nauseous, cold turn as they stared down the way she’d run, bright with humming, whispering Infection burning holes in their fading sight and motionless save for the spasmodic twitch of its growth, the air shimmering slightly like over the horizon at sundown in lands far away.

Hornet had left them, was the only thought spinning through their cloudy, fear-choked mind, catching in their throat and making their trembling redouble. She wouldn’t, Ghost insisted distantly, but there was nothing they could do to stop the attack now. Nothing they could say to convince themself something they remembered, with frightening clarity, very much happening before wasn’t the reality, not this time.

Ghost pressed their claws desperately against their chest, barely aware and clinging to the grounding scrape to pull them back, a last stopgap before all they could do was lose themself to what threatened to overwhelm them absolutely. They couldn’t stop, not here, not now.

But it was out of their hands, and Ghost could no longer so much as feel the dusty stone beneath their knees.

Something was shaking them, violently, and they nearly didn’t notice. It was only when it pulled their claws away, somehow slick with the chill of void, that the fear flooded back to where Ghost hadn’t noticed emptiness nearly take its place. It spiked all at once, buzzing like a live wire and soundlessly loud and Ghost lashed out with their claws, void hammering a panicked tempo in their shell. Their other hand was caught, and now, Ghost realized, they were both snared in vice-grips.

Ghost struggled blindly, writhing with more strength than they thought they had remaining to their control, but felt when, with difficulty, their hands were bound tight and Ghost was crushed bodily into something warm and solid.

Not crushed, they thought dully. Cushioned.

It was a surprise. Ghost had expected the cold, unforgiving and hard. They’d expected hollow bone.

And now there was something soft and lilting, an even noise that when the deafening rush and pounding receded ever so slowly, Ghost found resolved into a voice. Wordless, hesitant and hoarse and whispered, but constant. They latched onto it, followed it as it rose and fell, listened to it as it told them, somehow, of calm places, safe and hidden. It was gentle, and soothing, and familiar though Ghost knew they’d never heard it before.

Hornet was singing to them.

Softly, very softly, her song catching in her unpracticed voice and stumbling over notes she couldn’t quite remember and more precious than anything.

Their sister had pulled them into her lap and curled around them protectively, and they could feel her mask brush against theirs where she constantly moved her head, scanning for threats endlessly and rigid with awareness, battle-ready. Their hands, that Ghost noticed had a thin crusting of black around the claws as their vision began to clear and they turned their head enough to see, were tied only just tightly enough with faintly glowing silk to prevent Ghost from tearing away. They weren’t even properly wrapped, and if Ghost had been conscious enough to notice the loose binds, they could have wriggled free in an instant.

They saw she had one hand clamped onto her needle, holding it just above the ground in a grip that was shaking gently. Her other hand was at the back of Ghost’s head, carefully pressing their mask into her shoulder.

Ghost gave a full-body shiver, relieved beyond words, beyond their ability to feel anything else, and clumsily freed their hands to wrap their arms tight around Hornet’s shoulders and bury their face in their sister’s shawl. She was there, sharp and ungiving beneath the soft fabric and _there_. She hadn’t left.

Hornet startled badly to feel them move so suddenly, half raising her needle and her hushed song choking off.

“Little Ghost, what happened?” She whispered, head shifting as she darted her eyes around to keep watch on all the blinding, heated corners that might hold another hidden, snarling husk.

Ghost just shook their head and clung tighter. They felt Hornet give an anxious sigh, her chest expanding and contracting in one shallow movement.

“We can’t stay here. Will you be alright if I carry you?” She asked intensely, under her breath. “You must keep a good grip; I may need my hands open.”

Ghost didn’t think there was much likelihood of them letting go in the near future. They nodded, calming themself by degrees in the safe darkness of Hornet’s neckguard. Their chest stung, the chitin there raked over and raw while they hadn’t been themself enough to notice, but that, too, was being soothed as their void began to slow its restless, caged shaking and instead fill in the gaps.

They felt fragile, unsettled in their shell. Ghost curled their claws tighter into Hornet’s shawl, like the solidity of their grip on her might fix it all.

“Alright. We are very nearly to the entrance to the Fog Canyon. With luck, it will not be so overcome.” Hornet acknowledged and eased herself to her feet. She kept a securing arm around them, warm and far more grounding than the chill of their own void and chitin, even as she kept her needle drawn with the other.

Ghost counted the fast beating of her heart in place of one of their own, still slower than the faster twist of their void, running up against their shell and behind their eyes, and trickling like tears onto Hornet’s collar. Ghost supposed if they had any true tears to shed, now would be a good time.

It meant the same thing, whatever the cause.

Ghost wormed their way closer as Hornet stepped cautiously through a mostly quiet tunnel, save for the whisper of the Infection that was closer to a hum now, a song in its own right, one that sang of belonging and triumph and giving in and wrath. Ghost tightened their hold on Hornet’s shoulders and deliberately ignored it.

“Just up ahead,” Hornet panted. Ghost nodded into her collar, not daring to look up.

And then she jumped again, and fell for so long Ghost had to force themself not to look this time, to trust in her judgement and let her be the judge of her ability.

All at once the Infection quieted, and in its place the air was dense and muffled like they’d dipped their head underwater.

Hornet landed heavily, dropping to one knee and then the other, breathing fast and shallow. She stayed like that for a few moments, cradling them close until Ghost’s worry superseded the lingering remnants of their attack and they twisted in her grip to be let down.

She let them go without comment, and used the arm she’d had locked around them to instead hold herself up, claws dug into the flowering grass below.

Ghost hovered near her, drawing their nail and keeping their own shaky watch while Hornet recovered.

“Don’t ever do that again.” Hornet exhaled, her face angled towards the ground, almost inaudible past the strange consistency of the air.

She looked up at them, and Ghost saw with a guilty start that her eyes were just as fearful as theirs must have been, shining and halfway to panic herself. “ _Never_ do that again.” She repeated vehemently. “I wasn’t thinking of you. If I hadn’t glanced behind,” Hornet swallowed and tried again, calmer.

“I thought you enduring. Even when you were weak, I’d believed you’d never die on me. But if I hadn’t come back when I did, you would be dead. Do you understand why I intervened for you?” Hornet asked, looking at them from where she sat on the greenery below, eye-level with Ghost.

Ghost, cold with growing dread at her words, at the expectant, intense way she gave them, shook their head.

Hornet tilted her head disbelievingly at them. “I thought I’d been so clear. I suppose I truly am unpracticed with others. Ghost, you know very well that you are the linchpin of any future Hallownest might have, and you know also that I would do anything to see it endure.”

Ghost nodded slowly, hurt welling like blood from a wound, but she wasn’t finished.

“But that’s not why I went back for you. I am a spider of Deepnest, Ghost. I am never afraid. When I saw you were no longer behind me, that I was alone save the hideous growths whispering threats and promises into my mind and burning at the backs of my eyes, I was _terrified_. I’m still terrified. What have you done to me, little Ghost, to frighten me so?” Hornet asked, faintly incredulous, staring directly into Ghost’s eyes as though she expected them to answer.

“I have always cared, and always regretted, but I have never been fearful for another’s death, or even my own. Is it because I thought I could trust you to keep yourself safe, at least?”

Ghost was torn between reaching out to comfort her, still shaking on the edges of their own fear, and backing away from the betrayal in her voice. But her gaze, her open, accusing eyes, pinned them where they stood.

“If you must die, please,” Hornet said, very softly. “Please don’t die by my doing, directly or not. I will not lose another sibling. Not by my own hand.”

Hornet blinked and thin lines of tears ran down her mask. She raised a hand to her face and impatiently wiped them away.

“But we must press on.” She said, and got to her feet.

Ghost barreled into her, throwing their arms around her waist and squeezing like the world might end if they didn’t hold tight.

They’d known they could rely on each other, there was little else to rely upon. They’d even known that they had become so irrevocably attached that Hornet was now as important to them as the Hollow Knight, affection won by history and practice alike.

Ghost hadn’t known she’d relied upon them in the same way.

Ghost had, since nearly before they’d recalled when they’d first become friends and that they’d learned so long ago that they could always rely upon their sister, considered her untouchable. Older, though she might not even be that, and brave, steadfast and clever, a shadow to hide beneath and a caring embrace when they needed one. They hadn’t even considered that Hornet might think so highly of them as to imagine Ghost, too, as untouchable in a way. A permanent fixture in her life, unshakable by outside forces and unaffected by the many, many ways Hallownest offered to be killed.

They tightened their arms, as though that would tell her everything.

Their sister sighed heavily and detached their clinging grip. Before Ghost could be hurt and dismayed, she knelt down, far steadier now, and butted the tops of their masks together gently for just a moment.

“Neither of us are at liberty to show weakness now, little Ghost.” Hornet told them softly. “We are not nearly done yet, and time draws short. You concern me, and I am self-aware enough to know that I likely concern you, too. Yet we live on borrowed time.”

She drew back with a huff of forced laughter.

“Perhaps it’s good to have something to protect that will protect me back, for once.” Hornet said with dry humor, undercut with something still so worried. “You can beat me one-on-one in my own kingdom, so I suppose I can forgive you your moments. It was wrong of me to think you invincible, I think, when even I cannot claim as much.”

She sobered then, looking down at them with narrowed eyes. “You _will_ tell me what causes these things, these attacks, one day, and we will take precautions to ensure they never happen again. In the interim, tell me when something like that is about to happen. Tug at my shawl or grab my hand, only let me know if you have any warning. Let me know, so I might help.”

Ghost nodded quickly and launched themself with enthusiasm to headbutt her again, overcome by her words. They crashed their mask into Hornet’s, who reeled back with a startled hiss. Ghost stumbled back from the force as well, massaging their forehead.

“See if I ever show you compassion again,” Hornet threatened without any bite, gingerly pressing where her mask stretched between her eyes. “You little gnat.”

She stood back up and picked up her needle, glaring down at them. Ghost shifted their grasp on their own weapon and bobbled their head to express that they were ready when she was, unrepentant. It was practically tradition at this point, after all.

Hornet stared down at them, face inscrutable. And then she gave a startled, almost unwilling bark of a laugh.

“You feel so strongly and rebound from so much. It’s a wonder I ever doubted you.” She said. “Very well, let’s go; while the Infection is contained for now to the Crossroads, there is yet a long and difficult road to the Teacher’s Archives, where Monomon sleeps. And, unfortunately, quite a lot of jellyfish.” Hornet commented with wry distaste.

And with that she sheathed her needle and knelt to brace her hand on the ground at the edge of their little ledge, tucking her legs close and vaulting down to the next.

Ghost took a moment to check themself over, to make sure that slow-advancing, inexorable loss of control, the ridiculous, inescapable certainty that their sister would leave them behind, had dissipated enough to focus on something else, and followed. There was meaning in moving forward, a return of purpose, and Ghost fully intended to use the clarity to shove away their lingering unease, and that frightening fragility.

They’d been right, after all, and Hornet, too, for all the good it had done them. There was no time to do anything but press ahead.

But it was unusual for them to go through so many of these attacks in such quick succession. Or at least, Ghost suspected it was. Though they couldn’t quite remember if they’d had them before crossing Hallownest’s border, Ghost distinctly remembered surprise to feel so strongly after the nothing of the wastes, so long ago it felt like another lifetime, though it couldn’t have been more than a month.

Had they gotten more intense? Were they growing worse, less starkly obvious in what caused them, or was there simply so much going on, and so much turmoil where there had been the longest time of nothing much, that it was only a response to their heightened emotion?

Well, Ghost felt they were fairly emotioned-out for the moment, at least regarding the energy required to think very deeply about the delay they’d caused, their sister’s unpracticed soothing settling something long-fragile within their unsettled soul.

Instead, and Ghost thought that it was rather more productive, something fierce in their chest told them that they’d just have to prove to Hornet that they would never cause her fear again. And while they couldn’t control what Hornet fretted over, and Ghost was well aware she fretted more than she let on, they could give her fewer reasons to worry.

Ghost felt their nail press against their back, now so well-used that its weight and shifting over their cloak was as familiar as the cloak itself, and thought that wouldn’t be so difficult.

If nothing else, Ghost was very good at fighting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It truly was the perfect storm; the reminder that the Hollow Knight wasn't going to be able to hold much longer thrown in their face, the startling realization that there truly was a very real time limit ticking down for Hallownest itself, and, most importantly, the unconscious recognition of the patterns of behavior in a sibling that led, last time, to one of the most terrible things ever to happen to them. Anyone would falter under that, I think. 
> 
> Hornet, for her part, somehow (who'd have suspected?) has less of an iron grip on what she cares about than she thought. And a really terrible way of expressing, "I care if you live or die and I'm sorry you're having a bad time of it."
> 
> Am I allowed to analyze my own fic in the notes? Until someone stops me, I think so. Sorry Ghost.


	24. The Grave of the Learned

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Monomon left many an indelible mark on the world.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : None. Messing with jellyfish, which you shouldn't try at home.

As they left the infected Crossroads behind, Ghost looked instead to the Fog Canyon around them.

Like much of Hallownest, Ghost thought it a wonder, especially as keen as they were to keep themself focused on something external. They were beginning to worry they were only easily impressed, but Ghost also had the feeling that they had seen a million beauties, countless in every kingdom and in every disused trail, and Hallownest still was a sight to behold.

They had only their intuitions left of those places, whatever impressions had remained most strongly imprinted upon their mind, so it was a fair guess that they might, actually, be either a very easily impressed person or a very lucky one in their travels.

But the Fog Canyon was more than pretty; it was fascinating. The air was so humid it felt nearly like wading through solid mist, but it was more cooling than close or pressing. There was something unusual in it that made the distances below and above stain purple instead of black, the limits of their sight defined more by the fog than shadow. It might have been the same cryptic something that formed big bubbles over some of the plants, wet and cool and sticky to Ghost’s touch and leaving behind an equally sticky residue when they popped under Ghost’s claws.

Ghost followed Hornet down a steep path that curled and twined and sometimes split, difficult to follow through the density of the fog but leading unmistakably downward. Every surface was coated with a dense covering of greenery, moss and grasses and flowers alike, in a way that reminded them of Greenpath.

But whatever Hornet’s feelings on the place, Ghost liked it significantly better than Greenpath. The bubbles were harmless, for one, and so satisfying to pop that Ghost’s claws were coated in the congealed sticky stuff of their membranes before long.

For another, the charged floating jellyfish, propelling themselves lazily through the air with gentle undulations of their bells, hadn’t made a move in their direction. Ghost took a moment to scrutinize a larger one, trailing long lacy tendrils from a bell as big around as Ghost, from the translucent depths of which glowed something bright and orange.

It could only be Infection, though even as they were close enough to see themself dimly reflected in its shiny, faultless bell it only floated placidly on, up and then down.

Ghost thought that they could kill it in a single hit, and what harm could it do? They’d just burned through a healthy store of their soul, and if they were as near to the Archives as Hornet thought they were, they might need it soon. Their hand crept up to the handle of their nail.

“Don’t touch that,” Hornet called up at them from below. “It will explode violently.”

Ghost’s hand crept away from their nail.

Then they drew it and cut a neat blow through the dead-center of the bell, and as soon as the little ball of Infection began to pulse erratically even as the jellyfish itself deflated, they scrambled back and dropped past the edge of their overhang.

It whistled over their head and exploded against the far wall with a truly impressive shockwave and flash of burning light, dissipating so quickly there wasn’t a trace left in moments, the spent epicenter falling ineffectively to the moss.

Ghost landed neatly next to Hornet, her eyes narrowed and unimpressed, and innocently put away their nail. They thought it should have been reassuring indeed, to see that Ghost could handle the most dangerous thing they’d yet encountered in the Fog Canyon.

She scowled at them a moment more, then turned away and jumped down another long drop to the next ledge. “Don’t cry to me when you get blown apart, I have no sympathy for fools.” She said shortly over her shoulder before she went.

Ghost thought that might have been the case, and jumped down after her. Still, they thought they shouldn’t antagonize her even if they were sure they were faster by far than the vengeful jellyfish, if she wasn’t going to take the meaning they hoped to exhibit from its defeat. Though, they tempered privately, if she hadn’t warned them it might have been a different story.

It was, however, apparently encouragement enough to convince Hornet that they needed something aside from quiet contemplation of the scenery and the task ahead to focus on lest they make their own entertainment, because she began to talk.

And Ghost, for all their inherent excitement for discovery, liked to listen even more.

“The Fog Canyon was once only another part of Greenpath, long ago and long before my time.” Hornet began. “And remained so up until the founding of the Archives. Though I’ve never seen her in person, I was told that Monomon was a… Strange sort. Fond of questions, fonder of answers, and ingenious at inventing solutions no other would dream of.”

“As it happened, Fog Canyon was exactly as treacherous as Greenpath is now, down to the territorial squits at every overgrown cranny. As you might imagine, that made it difficult to get scholars to and from the Archives. The fog was Monomon’s solution.”

As though clairvoyantly sensing Ghost’s curiosity, or perhaps only used to them expecting her to elaborate, Hornet continued. “No, I don’t know how. Knowing the scholars under her tutelage, very occasionally and thankfully brief each time, I’m sure I’d never be able to wrap my head around it, and that any documentation of the process is either lost or indecipherable.” She said irately, as though the existence of something she was unsure of was an intentional and personal affront.

“What I _can_ understand is that she created the most irrational, ineffective, irritating creatures to guard her Archives imaginable,” She ground out. “And the world is better for each one I kill.”

Ghost thought there might have been a story behind that, but if there was, Hornet wasn’t sharing it, changing the topic though they stared at her in interest and nearly slipped off the slippery, greenery-coated ledge they perched on for their distraction.

“But stay alert, now. Much like Greenpath, acid still pools in the depths and ponds of the Fog Canyon, and we approach the broken road to that place of learning the Dreamer created.”

Ghost craned past her, now standing just below them and looking out over the final plunge to the hissing depths herself. The fog must have stymied the fumes from reaching them earlier, but the acid still bubbled menacingly beneath it. Just like Greenpath, Ghost thought wryly.

Hornet scaled a last gap and disappeared into a narrow entrance carved through the covered stone, and through the draping, coiling vines lying limp and crowded with bubbles Ghost could see it was carved like a path, though however it led from there had been long crumbled away and lost to time, fallen below to the acid.

Hallownest was an unwelcoming place to its very nature, Ghost thought. It seemed to them like all the careful planning and enduring infrastructure of the Kingdom’s past were only laid overtop its unforgiving nature, like its very bones slowly roiled beneath them and ground away at the civilization resting at its surface, restless and gnashing its teeth to tear down their accomplishments slower than a dozen lifetimes.

Nothing was truly eternal, Ghost thought as they stared down into the ceaseless churn of the acid, and especially not kingdoms.

But would it really still be Hallownest, once the Infection was gone? Ghost recalled that ancient stone corpse, lain still so long in the Abyss that the passing of time had turned its chitin to rock. Hallownest was old, but the world was older still. And maybe, once everything was settled, something new could begin in its worn traces.

“Come on, Ghost!” Hornet called from somewhere beyond the shadows of the vines, her voice edged with impatience.

Ghost glanced up from the endless turn of the acid and followed her down, leaping into the dark after her voice.

It was a path, they found. The ceiling above was arched and smooth and the floor below elaborately engraved where it wasn’t disrupted by deep cracks, scored into the stone by rivulets of scraping, eroding acid or shattered by the explosion of one of Fog Canyon’s gently undulating denizens. Ghost found they could easily imagine scholarly sorts walking along the stone, once flat and echoing and welcoming to those seeking to learn, to know and discover.

Could there ever have been a time when the scholars Hornet talked about sought knowledge for knowledge’s sake? Had they ever been curious about the world and all it held? Ghost didn’t know, and now Hornet’s and their footsteps were muffled not only by the rising lavender-tinted fog, soft and blurry as a dream, but by roots long overgrown and mosses creeping across the broken pillars. Ghost brushed their hand along a patch, disturbing a cluster of tiny bubbles. It felt cool as morning dew and sprung back after the pass of their palm, living and vibrant and growing.

Had any of the things the Archives’ scholars studied remained? They supposed they’d find out soon.

Quickly, the path became choked with the hovering littler jellyfish, clustered like a buzzing, sedate living wall of membrane and voltage. Ghost cut down the ones sparking directly in their path with only a quick slice of their nail, taking in the drips of soul they possessed and leaving the ones floating higher overhead. Their electric hum was loud and rattled through Ghost’s mask as they passed beneath, careful not to brush into any hanging tendrils, and Hornet followed with her mask tilted to lay her long horns lower against her back so as not to catch on any.

It was careful, quiet going, the air charged and somehow tense, but there were only so many jellyfish before the path opened into a steep stairway, and then out onto a wide courtyard, tall waving grasses growing up around broken pillars and clustered at the shore of an acid lake, reaching up like the moss had taken on tendrils of its own.

Before them was an imposing archway, set at its height with the looming mask of Monomon staring darkly down through carved, unchanging eyes. And standing beside the shore of the lake, staring past the archway and the long, narrow walkway it led down through the acid lake was Quirrel.

Ghost ran past Hornet and overshot the stairs entirely, choosing instead to leap from above them and hit the ground running. They bounded up to Quirrel, who heard them coming and looked to them with alarm.

Recognition lit his eyes after only a bewildered moment when Ghost stopped and waited, absolutely still, for him to greet them.

“Hello again, my short friend! How you seem to turn up when I am at my most hesitant. It’s truly something, isn’t it? A building atop an acid lake.” He marveled.

Ghost looked out and saw he was right. The Archives was a towering structure, yet oddly squat, as though the acid it sat safely within was drawing it slowly down. Whatever it was constructed of gleamed an odd color like old bronze in the acid’s glow, weathered and enduring and scoured of plant-life by the fumes or the distance, or the simple fact that the metal that made up its walls couldn’t support roots.

Its rounded windows glowed like tired wet-green eyes in the sallow face it turned to its entrance. It looked, to Ghost at least, like more of a prison than an archive, less of a place of learning and more like a cursed tomb, lit from the acid hissing below and somehow closed-off.

“Have I met you?” Hornet asked behind them, less of a question and more of a searching call to confess. “Yes, that’s right. The Dreamer’s wanderer.” She answered herself without waiting for Quirrel to respond.

“Oh, dear. Hello, ah…?” Quirrel trailed off meaningfully.

“Hornet.”

“Hornet, of course. I’m gratified you’re less inclined to kill me this time.”

Ghost looked accusingly up at her, but if Hornet noticed she gave no indication.

“So it would seem.” She answered simply. “You’ve come to answer to her, then?”

“I’m afraid I’m not sure who you’re talking about,” Quirrel said apologetically. “But I have been… Drawn here, I think. It feels…” Quirrel trailed off, pulling a thoughtful face. “It beckons me. I don’t think the only thing calling me is my lust for discovery, this time.” He laughed stiffly.

“I’d imagine not.” Hornet said slowly. She stared at Quirrel as though evaluating him, but against what measure, Ghost couldn’t guess.

“I think you’d better come with us.” She decided gravely.

Quirrel looked to her with mild concern. “You make it sound like I’ve no choice in the matter.” His voice lilted up at the end like a question, though his tone was still friendly and open.

“If you think you’ve got a choice, it is no fault of mine. I’m not the reason you’ll soon face what lies within. I only suggest that we travel together.” Hornet said with a scowl. “I suspect we will have use for you before our task is through.”

Quirrel looked politely alarmed. “I think that’s an unreasonably cryptic thing to tell someone who is already having an unreasonably cryptic day.” He advised.

Ghost found they agreed, bobbling their head some and looking back up at their sister. Whatever Hornet had in mind she must have decided on just now, because they had no clue what she meant.

Hornet sighed harshly. “Your mask. It’s Monomon’s, yes?”

Quirrel went stiff. “My mask?”

“Yes, the one on your head. The same one that repelled me when I… Mistook you for a scavenger.” Hornet amended the last with a minute glance down at Ghost.

Ghost tilted their head questioningly.

Hornet caved. “All right, fine. I tried to kill him. It was thoughtless of me, and I’m sorry. Are you happy?”

Not especially, but they supposed that was more of an apology than they’d expected. Ghost gestured to Quirrel.

Hornet scowled, but leveled her glare at Quirrel instead. “I’m sorry for trying to kill you.” She ground out like she would have liked to try again.

“I- Thank you. I appreciate the apology.” Quirrel said graciously. “Now, Monomon,” He redirected. “The name is so familiar, yet I cannot place it. Who is that?”

“She is the Dreamer who calls you back. More will return to you when you complete her task. Or perhaps it won’t, you scholars are inexplicable.” Hornet dismissed.

Quirrel drew himself up, offended for the first time. “Now, listen-“

“Let’s go. We’re wasting time.” Hornet cut him off and brushed past, striding onto the thin path over the acid without hesitation, her steps transitioning to quiet metallic tapping and fading fast as she covered ground.

Quirrel sighed, staring helplessly after her, and looked down at Ghost, still stood by his side.

“I suppose you know her, then? Did she try to kill you too?” He asked with a commiserating half-smile.

Ghost shook their head quickly, thought for a moment, then slowly nodded.

“Ah, perhaps that’s how she meets new people. She seems to like you well enough after all, my friend. Tell me, is she always so… High-strung?”

Ghost nodded again without hesitation.

“Hm. Well, it’s a good thing she has you, little friend. She seems more driven to see my journey to the end than even I am. No use in waiting, then, and delaying the inevitable. Would you accompany me?” Quirrel asked again.

Ghost nodded once more and held out their hand. Quirrel didn’t seem to have expected them to offer it, blinking in surprise, but quickly his expression became something fond and only slightly bemused. He took their hand with hardly a shiver and they led him across.

“You know, if you don’t mind my observation, you seem much more animated now, little one. There is somehow more to your eyes, or perhaps you only seem to know yourself better, if that makes sense. Did you ever find a way to open the Black Egg?” Quirrel commented, holding a hand to Monomon’s mask as he tilted his head up to gaze at the approaching entrance of the Archives.

And wasn’t that a difficult question, Ghost thought. They nodded slowly. They _had_ , and they would.

“I’m glad. You were so intent on it, it’s good to see a wanderer find what they searched for. Perhaps one day you can tell me the story, though my sign could use some work.”

Ghost looked up at him quickly, inclining their head to indicate that he go on.

“Ah, it’s a little embarrassing, but I only grasped that you were not only unwilling, but entirely incapable of speech once we’d parted ways from the Temple. And our interaction before the City of Tears wasn’t long enough to bring up the topic, though I suspect it would have made this one easier. Would you prefer I use what I know, now that I’m aware?” Quirrel explained sheepishly.

Ghost tightened their grip on his hand and pulled him faster along the bridge, to Quirrel’s exclamation of surprise. Hornet stood at the open entrance before the immense doors hanging listless and rusted, looking up at it from below, and turned when she heard them approach.

“Is something wrong?” She asked, instantly on guard.

Ghost shook their head excitedly and let go of Quirrel’s hand to point at him insistently.

“What? I wasn’t going to leave him.” Hornet muttered defensively enough to make Ghost suspect that she’d entertained the thought.

“I think what they want has to do with sign language. I’d just mentioned it.” Quirrel glanced down at Ghost for confirmation, to which they nodded with enthusiasm.

“Oh. _You_ know the hand-language?” Hornet said incredulously.

“Well, I know a dialect of it, yes. I recall there are quite a few variants, with various numbers and capabilities of hands in mind, and then for most languages.” Quirrel responded, thoroughly mystified. “Are you saying you don’t know any? Do they?”

“No, neither of us know how to speak it. Speakers of more languages than the most common aren’t in great abundance in Hallownest.” Hornet said flatly. “Though if anyone were to break the mold, I suppose it _would_ be a scholar,” She said like it was a rude word. Quirrel bristled again, but Hornet spoke over him. “Would you be willing to teach us?”

“Of course I would, I suppose I’ll have nothing but time and a few destinations in mind once this has wrapped up.” Quirrel agreed easily. “It isn’t a difficult language to master the basics of, I learned it for fun in my spare time when-“ He stopped short and frowned. The pause dragged on while they waited for him to explain, but he never did.

Ghost empathized.

Quirrel laughed, though he seemed shaken. “I suppose I’ll find out the circumstances soon. Or maybe not. At any rate, I don’t think I can stand the waiting.”

Hornet nodded slowly and entered the Archives without another word, though not before giving him a curious, narrow-eyed look.

And the Archives beckoned them all within.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ghost, that is Not how you keep your sister from worrying. But here's a hint of our favorite pillbug again, before his big moment. And wouldn't you know it, he's got a pretty useful skill still bouncing around in that big befuddled brain of his. I suppose this means he'll have to stick around, narratively speaking.
> 
> Not terribly much happens this chapter, but it'll allow the next three to slot pretty nicely together. We're nearing the end, folks, comin' in hot. 
> 
> And I'd like to apologize in advance for the mess my update schedule might be going forward. The internet on the device I use to write and post will probably be unusable for the foreseeable future, and given the pandemic (and I suppose this is the plague diary I'm leaving, which maybe says something) I won't be able to just take my laptop somewhere with a connection. Yes, I'm aware of the irony of writing Hollow Knight fanfiction with the virus going on. If it turns out I /can/ upload next Friday, I will, and I'll delete this part of the notes. If I can't, I'll update both sets of chapters the Friday after that for consistency's sake. Stay safe, y'all.


	25. Darkened Doors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Archives are protected still. 
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Mild angst, more jellyfish murder, brief physical harm

The open entrance to the Archives was much emptier than Ghost felt it should be, like the place had been stripped and hunted over to its bare bones. As Hornet strode through it the full, echoing darkness of the place, so different from the other darknesses Ghost had known, swallowed her up and let her surface again as she passed tank after tank of hauntingly illuminated acid, the only things truly left to take space in the entrance hall.

Quirrel still seemed at a loss, staring up into the Archives’ higher floors, visible as open landings unassumingly backlit by the same gentle greenish light as the outer windows as though he expected to see someone there, but then he ran a claw over the rim of the mask overtop his head and placed a bracing hand on the nail at his side and sighed.

“Let’s see what she has in store.” He said faintly to no one in particular, and Ghost followed him in.

If the exterior of the Archives stood out in the dim by the reluctant, low illumination of the acid lake, inside it was flooded by heavily tinted light like a miasma. Only just past the entrance hall the Archives opened into what must have been the main building, sectioned off here and there by corridors and rooms but almost entirely open. What Ghost could see circled around a central point, every wall curved and every walkway sloping gently inward.

It was in direct contrast to much of the rest of Hallownest, which all was built with directness and efficiency in mind, at least in its layout. As they followed Quirrel, who walked now with purpose and rarely glanced around at the sights, looking instead ahead with the surety of one who knew exactly where they were going next, Ghost found themself wondering if they’d passed this stairwell before, or that window, or a particularly cloudy cluster of acid tanks rising like watchful pillars from the floor.

“It seems lonesome to you, doesn’t it?” Quirrel asked vaguely as he led them deeper, his voice as cloudy as the acid. “As though there should be _more_ , right?”

Ghost had thought as much in nearly his exact words, yet they didn’t think they’d meant it in quite the same way. Quirrel sounded wistful, mournful almost, or maybe he was only bemoaning how little there was to see after the countless, inscrutable tanks of acid, lined up and secured to the floor for reasons Ghost couldn’t imagine. He was a wanderer, after all.

And this was an archive, wasn’t it? So where was the archive? They didn’t expect for all the knowledge or records it had to offer to be front and center the moment they’d walked through the door, but Ghost had at the least anticipated a few bookshelves or old, carefully stored scrolls or tablets. Fog Canyon wasn’t nearly as humid as the City of Tears, the acid’s blistering vapors lessened inside and the air otherwise as dry as the wastes, surely less lasting writing would have survived, too? But there were only the endless rows of metal columns with their clear glass fronts, behind which the acid ran endlessly.

“Maybe lonesome is the wrong word,” Quirrel mumbled. “It feels abandoned. Methodically, deliberately abandoned. I’m not sure why, but I’d expected much more. And why leave the acid systems intact and running? Look,” Quirrel walked closer to a smaller tank and, with careful, precise claws at odds with the easy way he wore his nail, manipulated the console at its base.

The saturating acidic glow washed over his face, casting shadows under eyes darting and lighter than black before the tank, every detail obscured by the shadows or the contrast against his pale face mercilessly clear. Quirrel looked tired, Ghost realized, and old, and worried. He looked the sort of tired that didn’t understand itself, like cooled water that wouldn’t crystalize until one dipped a prompting claw into its surface. He looked like how Ghost felt when they’d been so shaken by their lost memories, until they’d lost too much to care.

At Quirrel’s attentive hands the acid began to glow reluctantly brighter, until miniscule scribbles of writing drew themselves together within it, amassing into a long paragraph of something that resembled Hallownest’s writing, but in such a strange shorthand that Ghost couldn’t understand a word.

“See? It’s all there. It’s all working, I could draw from any tank in the Archives here. Except, of course, the madam’s-“ Quirrel’s considering voice cut off. He hovered there a moment, face frozen and hands held over the tank, gesturing to something within its depths.

Then he abruptly drew back with a breathless, slightly bitter laugh. “Nothing. I’d nearly said something interesting, but I’ve no idea what. Who is Monomon, and what does she want with me? I suspect I know the answer, though I can’t yet touch it.” Quirrel sighed, reaching up to tilt his overlarge mask forward some.

Ghost only watched him as he stared into the acid a minute longer, eyes tracing knowledge written ages past. Then he made a quiet, amused noise and turned back to them.

“No use lingering, then.” He said cheerfully, though now that Ghost had noticed it was impossible to miss how tired his eyes were, how his voice didn’t quite match them.

They nodded anyway and let him retake the lead. Hornet had disappeared some time since, probably to scout ahead for wherever the Dreamer lay. Ghost had thought she’d have circled back by now, if nothing else then due to the looping of the halls, but she was nowhere to be seen.

Quirrel led them to a little door that amongst all the others Ghost would never have thought to open, and behind it was a narrow, rickety stairwell that coiled tightly downward. The air here grew pungent, and while the entirety of the Archives lingered with the smell of the acid, this stair was clotted with it.

And as they descended, Ghost began to see some of the wonder the Archives had hidden away. Even such an empty place couldn’t be completely emptied of the Dreamer’s influence.

Little jellyfish, small and luminously green, rose and fell and spun like drifting seeds on the wind. Each was less the sickly green of the acid or membranous and clear like their larger kin outside, but brilliant and soft as solid light. Ghost reached for one with intrigued claws, as they were more or less small enough to fit in their cupped hands, but as they touched it the jellyfish faded like a memory and another appeared inches away. This jellyfish undulated in excited little pulses and propelled itself further, fading in and out a few more times before it decided the danger was past and settled back into the carefree acrobatics of its companions.

Quirrel chuckled behind them, and as Ghost turned to look they saw he had a jellyfish perched on his flattened hand, tiny tendrils brushing without urgency against his palm, and another resting atop his mask, and a third on the opposite shoulder.

“The trick is to be slow and steady,” Quirrel told them through a gentle smile, one that this time reached his eyes. “These ones don’t see, but they do sense disturbance in the air around them. If one is very calm, they’ll take you for a convenient little perch.”

Fascinated, Ghost held out their hand to a nearby jellyfish as it floated closer. It didn’t react until it was nearly brushing their carefully even hand, but then it gave a few fluttering course-corrections and settled itself lightly over their claws. Its tendrils grazed their chitin with every lazy squeeze of its bell, light as snow settling over a cloak and more sensation than touch, like a nearly unnoticeable shock with each contact.

Ghost held rigidly still, watching the thing as closely as they could, the way its soft-edged glow flickered ever so slightly with its slowing movements and how its light filtered through the bell, banked and still brighter than a dozen of the acid tanks with which it shared a hue. A lively little remnant, active and complacent.

“They’re lovely little things, aren’t they? Good companionship for long days.” Quirrel said softly. “They take patience, and a level head, but they reward such things so readily with trust.”

Ghost nodded slowly. Quirrel laughed.

“You’re just as much a curious adventurer as I, aren’t you, my small friend? You regard such a trivial phenomenon with as much open wonder as the whole of Hallownest spread before you. Not that I blame you. I’ve always been fond of the smaller things too, the little moments. They’re what makes the grand sights so impressive. What makes it all worth it.”

“It’s refreshing, to say the least. I’m afraid that while the denizens of Hallownest are fine people, they aren’t keen on its mysteries. Though I’m coming to wonder myself if they aren’t wiser than I for that.” Quirrel said wryly.

He took a careful step down, gently dislodging the jellyfish that had settled over him. “Let’s pursue this one to its end, though,” He continued. “I’m beginning to think Hornet was right to say that I won’t be able to walk away from it.”

Ghost gave their jellyfish a little boost back into the air, from which it fluttered energetically away, and followed.

At the base of the stairwell was the acid lake itself lapping below a thin metal grate, visible and hissing malevolently. Quirrel paid it no mind as he set off across this lowest floor, where pipes and levers sprouted like worms’ ways from the curving walls, but the slats kept catching on Ghost’s claws such that they had to pay close attention to where they put their feet.

“Just a little further,” Quirrel said as they rounded a corner, and then from somewhere ahead there came back a wave of electricity, brightening the acid in the tanks around and fizzling over the walls, stymied by where they met with the grated floor.

From the same way Ghost heard Hornet’s ferocious battle cry, clearly bellowed at the top of her lungs even as it echoed distantly through the empty metal corridors.

They were sprinting towards it without a thought, and were faintly relieved to hear Quirrel run after them without even a question to where they were going. Ghost was surprised, though, when he easily kept pace with them, drawn nail at his side, taking just as easily to the promise of a fight as he took to the Archives’ secrets.

“She won’t be able to fight it,” He yelled over the now-apparent sounds of battle, clear over the jarring clang of their claws over metal.

Something like dawning horror was in his voice when he spoke again. “Oh Wyrm, she won’t be able to fight it! The membrane is too thick, it renews itself too quickly. She won’t know how to make it vulnerable.”

Ghost drew their nail as they ran.

Quirrel knew all the right turns to make as the acid-light grew brighter with the quickly mounting regularity of acid tanks, huge and spanning floor to ceiling, and then the metal of the walls converged on a central point and plunged into the acid lake below.

But where the acid should have risen to meet them, there was a deep, cavernous room hollowed into the acid itself, though even at its bottom Ghost could see the faint greenish tint where the depths began again.

Before that, though, was the largest jellyfish they’d ever seen.

Its massive bell was large enough to hold a dozen or more of its stinging kin outside, each already as large or larger than Ghost, but all that the shifting, bubble-like swirl of its membrane contained was a core swollen and bright with Infection, a pulsing orange that made it chase after Hornet, a small red blur darting about the room, with malicious intent and nearly as fast as she dodged to avoid it.

Ghost would have jumped in and buried their nail’s point in the thing’s thick bell, humming and internally illuminated by streaks of jittering lightning, but Quirrel held an arm out to stop them.

He spoke before they could protest. “It’s Uumuu, like I’d thought. Listen to me little one, I’ll breach the membrane of its bell, which will disable its ability to gather charge until it’s resealed itself. You must kill it before this happens. Do you understand?” Quirrel told them, calm and concise.

He looked terribly sad, Ghost noticed, though it didn’t show in his voice, which was as open and kind as ever, and determined. A glance below where Hornet still worked to keep ahead of the creature, Uumuu, banished any hesitation that caused. They nodded decisively and jumped down before he could stop them any longer, onto one of a series of platforms edging out of the smooth walls.

“Don’t attack it, Ghost!” Hornet called to them, her voice rough and winded. “It might electrocute you. We must find a way to breach-“

And with that, Quirrel lanced down like a thrown longnail with a cry of his own, breaking and unpracticed and confident all the same. His thin nail, which Ghost had long admired for its clean, precise lines and gleaming edge, shone bright as though it were reflecting of the sun as he used his momentum to drive it clean through Uumuu’s membrane, changing the angle of his grip at the last moment to slice a wide gash into the gelatinous substance with a sound somewhere between the wet pop of a bubble and the tear of the first bite into the skin of a fruit. Even as he drew his nail back from the blow, Quirrel landed neatly nearby and was gone again in an instant, perching just below the ceiling and poised to attack.

The swollen bell immediately deflated and the electric brightness dimmed, leaving only the orange of its infected core. Uumuu slowed and hovered in place, the substance of its membrane already melting together to seal the breach.

“Now, Ghost! Strike at the core!” Quirrel shouted, but it was Hornet who lunged first.

She gave a furious shout and launched herself off of the platform she’d landed on, plunging her needle directly into Uumuu’s core. The impact jolted it through the air until it hit another platform and rolled to its side, tentacles lashing to right itself.

Hornet held it in place and drove her needle deeper. “Ghost!” She roared, struggling to keep her feet atop its shifting mass, decreased but still hulking under her needle and the shine of her silk and burning hot with Infection, but Ghost was already dashing close.

They let her pin the creature to the metal below and, in a single blow, severed most of its tentacles. Uumuu shuddered and lurched under Hornet and with a cry she withdrew her weapon and jumped away in the moment before she was thrown off.

Its bell washed closed and inflated with a muffled boom, and it drew on its electricity to jump out at the metal it touched. Hornet was somewhere above, and Ghost heard Quirrel’s warning yell, but the charge moved faster than they did, stood directly before it and close enough to feel the leaking heat of Infection.

It arched through their body and sizzled out in their void, incapable of jolting them rigid but searing instant, branching tracts over their chitin and whiting out their vision with the intensity.

It was only a moment before they could shake their head some and stir their void to replace what was hurt behind the holes of their mask to let them see again, the smell of burning chitin and bone and Hornet’s shouting filtering through their senses, but already Uumuu loomed huge over them, reaching out with tentacles bright with charge, so close Ghost could see the rainbow shimmer and mix of its dense membrane.

They gripped their nail, the thing they’d never let go of no matter what, and lashed it at the tendrils closest with a wide sweep of their arm, nearly uncontrolled so the inevitable pain wouldn’t make it falter. Each one shocked electricity down the weapon as it was severed, but nothing like the power of before, only enough to make their palm smoke gently and burn like they’d held it to an open flame. Ghost felt grim satisfaction to see the already-melting things writhe on the ground, separated from the creature itself.

Uumuu drew back by inches, undulating with tremulous fury, and Quirrel was there again. Again his nail punched through its membrane, and again with a flick of its length he opened a gaping wound. Ghost got to their feet and threw themself at it nearly before its bell collapsed on itself with a wet noise, striking shallower marks that nonetheless caused its core to bleed burning orange.

Then Hornet was beside them once more, striking again from above with devastating force directly into the center of the orange mass. Uumuu shuddered, membrane shifting to seal again, but they didn’t give it the chance to. Ghost cut at its center, smoothed over with deflated membrane, and this time struck something denser within.

Uumuu gave an anguished, raging scream more pain than sound, and its core expanded with a sudden rapid swell of Infection, which flooded inside the burst bell where it lay flat against the metal and then out from the cuts in it like a hot rush of blood.

It gave a final, jittering full-body twitch, and fell still.

The only noise was the slow drip and fizz of Infection sliding off the platform and into the acid below, and Hornet’s labored breathing.

Quirrel jumped down beside them both, stumbled forward a step, and braced his hands on his knees with a shaky laugh. “I daresay I,” He paused to gasp for breath. “I performed fairly well for my age. Are you alright?”

“What was that thing? No, I don’t care, why did you take so long?” Hornet demanded breathlessly in response. “I’ve been fighting it for far longer than it should have taken to find your way down here.”

Ghost saw that she was shaking with exhaustion and sheathed their nail to tug at her shawl for her attention, then gestured for her to sit with an imploring tilt of their head. Hornet waved them off with a single short motion, her dark eyes fixed and unforgiving and her shoulders heaving unevenly with the effort of standing motionless and angled to intimidate.

Quirrel, as Ghost was coming to expect, was utterly unphased by the posturing and in its place only genuinely apologetic. “I’m sorry, Hornet, I hadn’t remembered Uumuu was here until,” Quirrel pulled a resigned face. “Until I heard the fighting.”

“That doesn’t explain why I was running from it for nearly an hour. So I ask again, _what_ took you so long?” Hornet snarled.

Quirrel rubbed a sheepish hand under the back of the overlarge mask on his head, tilting it forward a little. “Would you believe that we were distracted by Uumuu’s smaller relations?” He asked gingerly.

“It better have been a vicious battle.” Hornet intoned, unimpressed.

Quirrel snorted with laughter before he could stop himself. “Deadly.” He said lightly, his calming voice in full force to persuade her away from vengeance.

It worked reasonably well, because Hornet scowled at him and evidently decided it wasn’t worth the effort, turning instead to look Ghost over with growing concern.

“Are you alright, little Ghost?” She asked, eyes drawn to their charred nail-hand. “You took a direct hit.”

Ghost nodded quickly and focused, feeding trickles of soul into their void to remake itself with. The void regrew and flowed anew to replace what chitin had been half-melted onto the handle of their nail, lessening and then removing altogether the raw stinging burn, and then showed her their unmarked hand.

Hornet took hold of their arm with steady hands and brushed dark, burned chitin dust carefully from its surface to find fresh, unharmed glossy black underneath. She hummed thoughtfully.

“What an interesting gift,” Quirrel exclaimed. “It’s only been minutes.”

Hornet looked back at him, angry again. “You are extremely lucky this ended in our favor, scholar,” She told him sharply.

“You’re welcome,” Quirrel said as though she’d generously thanked him for his contribution to that ending.

“So lead us now to the Dreamer. This must have been her guard; she should lie nearby.” Hornet finished.

“Yes, Uumuu was,” Quirrel started with a fond smile, that fell from his face so completely and quickly that Ghost tensed.

“Ah,” He murmured, voice still carefully light. “Uumuu was. How characteristic of me to be distracted so easily.”

Quirrel turned and gazed at the fallen jellyfish, draped huge and deflated partially over the platform they stood on and with its edges hanging over the edge. It lay still and oozing darkening orange that dripped through the grating steadily, most of its tentacles detached and its core mostly cut apart.

Quirrel’s face tightened to look at it.

“Might I tell you about it, so someone will remember? I’m afraid I don’t have the best track record.” He said faintly.

Hornet made the start of a sound like a hard dismissal, but caught herself before it was out of her mouth. She looked carefully at his back as he stood before the slowly dissolving creature, head bowed some, and nodded.

“What was it?” Hornet asked him.

The seconds dragged on and Quirrel stood still like he hadn’t heard her, staring at the fallen corpse starting to melt apart drip by drip.

Then Quirrel gave a soft, slightly despairing laugh. “You know, I can’t quite remember. My friend. It was my friend.”

Hornet fell quiet, watching him. Then she gave another shallow nod and sat herself down onto the metal below. Ghost stood beside her, and together they allowed Quirrel to mourn something neither of them understood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh Quirrel, I could write thousands of words about you. Think of all the ridiculous speculative bug science! But as much as I love him, this isn't his fic. The note for the next chapter is far too long, so I'm going to put this here; Quirrel is happy. It doesn't happen on-screen, but he'll be supported and busy and really have a more pleasant time of memory-shenanigans than Ghost did. I'm sure he'll write a few books before the outside world starts to trickle away, and he'll have a lot of people to be there for him when it does. At least two. Probably quite a few more, he's a friendly guy.
> 
> In other news, Uumuu's is definitely my favorite fight so far. To play through? Not especially. To inflict on the Vessel that's steadily becoming life's favorite chewtoy (Ghost)? Absolutely.


	26. One Who Knew and Still Tried

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Monomon was a brilliant mind, but dire circumstances spare none. Sometimes there are no good options to be had.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Brief Infection-related body horror (Hollow again), monologuing, Ghost holding up as well as they can.

It didn’t take as long as Ghost would have thought for Quirrel to heave a quiet sigh and turn back to them, but his eyes were no less sad for it.

Did he mourn his friend, or all those things he couldn’t remember, an entire life? Ghost didn’t know, and by the way Quirrel smiled at them, his face closed off and returned to blankly pleasant politeness, they thought they never would.

“Let’s go, then. Monomon awaits us.” Quirrel said, and leapt down to a platform near to the acid below, so low that the droplets it spit up sizzled against the scored metal.

There Quirrel touched a console in the wall next to a closed door, which sprang open with a piercing shriek of rusted metal that caused him and Hornet both to flinch. The way ahead was dark, illuminated only by the filtered glow of the acid below where it sat in pools to the sides of the walkway stretching long and curving ahead. Quirrel didn’t hesitate, and they followed him as he strode with uncharacteristic certainty deeper into the Archives’ depths.

There were more than a handful of stairwells and doors leading off into this deeper subset of the Archives, but Quirrel took none of them, choosing instead to remain on the main path as it began to be lit by fixtures rising from the ground. Slowly, the acid tubes began to reappear, different from before in that the acid remaining in these was cloudier and concentrated with something, wasn’t shifted and cycled by whatever mechanisms remained.

And then it opened into a wider room, shaped like nothing so much as a very tall oval. The ceiling was high above the level where they walked, but the far side of the room was only perhaps twenty feet from the door. It was lined along the entirety of the walls, save where a single staircase curled up around to a higher platform, with tall, ribbed acid tanks bubbling and milky-green.

And in the center, hanging down from the ceiling like an oblong bubble of glass and clear, brightly glowing acid was another tank, larger than all the others and unadorned, the smooth glass only altered by dust and the faint stains of ages gone. Within it hung long, thin tentacles that reached and effervesced into nothing, disembodied and shifting gently in the clearer acid.

Hornet moved on ahead, carefully watching the great tank as she climbed the steps up to it, and Ghost followed, curious for a better look.

It had to be Monomon, the second Dreamer, but she was different. She was, of course, missing something.

“This is where she stored the Kingdom’s knowledge,” Quirrel said conversationally from behind them. When Ghost looked down at him, following them slowly up the stairs with a thoughtful hand brushing the dusty rail, he continued, gazing up where the tendrils in the tank met with nothing but empty acid.

“And here, at the Archives’ core, she stored herself. All the information and thought and resources at her disposal, and she saw no option to save Hallownest but to willingly become a seal.” He said without inflection but sounding so tired, looking up where her head might be.

“Though I suppose all that knowledge wasn’t for nothing. This is an additional protection, something I only remember now that I’m in front of her. I can’t even recall it happening, but I played a part.” Quirrel touched careful claws to the mask on his head, letting them rest there a moment, then took it off. He turned it around in his hands and looked into the empty eyes, something longing and conflicting playing behind his own.

“Quite an extended part. I’m sure she didn’t intend to have taken this long.” Quirrel said with an exhausted laugh, just this side of a sigh, and offered it up to the tank.

The mask beamed bright for a moment, then dissipated into light, bright like lumaflies, like soul. Ghost could hardly look at it, but when it had faded Monomon lay sleeping and whole in her tank.

Her cloak billowed in the acid around it, waving slowly as it stirred, but Monomon herself was as still as the grave. Dreaming.

Quirrel took a step back, looking oddly vulnerable without her mask on his head, his antennae tied back instead with the bandana he kept beneath it. He stared up at her, Monomon’s newly reformed head suspended only just high enough above his own to make it necessary, and for only a moment Ghost saw him tense like the Dreamer before him had taken him by surprise. But then Quirrel glanced back at them and there was nothing but resignation and that blankly kind expression they now knew covered anything else he might feel, seeing Monomon whole again.

But his hands shook before he hooked them casually into the belt his nail hung from. He nodded to the tank, eyes squinting some with an attempt to smile encouragingly.

“Don’t hesitate. This is what you must do to unseal the Black Egg. Isn’t that what you want?” Quirrel chuckled, the noise raspy and strained, and cleared his throat. “I wonder now if you and she weren’t of a shared goal. Whatever you would do, she seems to welcome it.”

“Be brave, friend.” He told them softly when Ghost didn’t move, as though Ghost were hesitating for their own sake.

Hornet shifted like she’d have liked to say something, but kept her peace.

Ghost looked to him and back to the tank where the Teacher inside floated, unconscious of the strife Quirrel felt for her fate.

No, Ghost thought. She didn’t deserve to die either. Not if she didn’t need to, not if Quirrel loved her so. Lurien’s seal was broken without his death; why not Monomon’s?

They drew the Dream Nail back and felt it dash against the Dreamer’s sleeping mind, and then they, too, slept.

The dream was just as before. Clouds rose dark and menacing from below, crowded also from above like enemies, and in the distance, obscured almost totally by them all, there was reddened light like a vast fire. Brighter than Lurien’s dream, and closer. Dazzling motes drifted, though there was no breeze, ascending ever upward.

And, as ever within dream, those gleaming spirographs spun their slow dance, faded in and out like shafts of light through a tree’s branches. They reminded Ghost of seals, of snowflakes, in their variance.

And as before, in front of them hung the brightest mote of all, resolving as they approached it into Monomon’s form.

She hung quiet and asleep like Lurien, but where Lurien had seemed small and almost helpless, Monomon was a creature that commanded respect even like this. She was much, much taller than Lurien, and the traditional style of the cloak that only just stretched down perhaps half of her torso did little to hide the otherness of her, illuminated from below where often a cloak fostered shadow.

Ghost hadn’t thought anything of it before, and particularly not in Monomon’s own archives, but the Teacher was uncanny. Divorced from the mirrored glow of her acid tanks and tranquil, reinforced Archives, the glow of Monomon’s tentacles stood out amongst the different glow of the dream. Ghost had never seen another like her, they were certain.

Whatever her story was, they might get to hear it.

Ghost did exactly as they had before, drawing back the Dream Nail and holding it until the force deadened their hands and blinded their eyes, until its edge was so sharp it would cut through any dream and any nightmare. When they swung it forward and heard the sudden snap of the breaking seal, again it took them some time to adjust.

Monomon, however, didn’t collapse like Lurien did. When the light faded from their eyes enough to see her still floating, their void crawled with the mounting dread that it hadn’t worked, that they’d have to come back to Quirrel and her corpse. Or would it be worse to have nothing at all in her vast tank, nothing to say goodbye to?

“I do hope you haven’t made a terrible mistake, little Vessel.” A calm voice said from above.

Ghost shook the last of the glare from their sight and looked up.

Monomon was gazing down at them, her mask still and blank, unmoving black on white. Her bell undulated slowly, like she was swimming, and Ghost realized that she had floated closer until she loomed over them in the uncertain light of the dream.

“But then, I hope also that I haven’t made one equally terrible. I’ve sacrificed much to see you now. Do not let it go to ruin.”

Monomon turned her head some and gazed around. “The dream, then.” She said flatly. “And in the furthest reaches of Her own domain. A clever place to hide, truly, for the safest place to swim is right behind the shark.”

She looked down at Ghost, who stumbled back to their feet, and made a disappointed sound. “Unfortunately small. I doubt you have the strength to defeat the, ah, not-quite Pure Vessel. What could that tiny nail of yours do, against the Radiance’s might? Very little.” She said decisively.

“Yet I’ve thrown my chance at your feet, and the Vessel dies. Perhaps there’s a chance, should you bring the Protector with you. You’ve made it this far after all. Though that may well doom us all, mightn’t it?” Monomon asked them thoughtfully, and didn’t wait for them to respond.

She began to pace, head bowed, floating from one side of the aged stone amongst the clouds to the other. “How dangerous devotion is. Unavoidable, yes, but so dangerous. To care for another over greater things, over a world. No. There is no room for it, not when the Kingdom lies weakening, falling by degrees. Hallownest may be truly doomed, because you’ve convinced its Protector to value your life nearly above it. Or what’s left of it, I suppose.”

Monomon hummed thoughtfully. “Perhaps the Protector is only tired of watching family die. If she weren’t the only thing holding the remains of this kingdom intact I’d be tempted to dismiss the Wyrm’s dalliance as a mistake, if only for her apparent inability to understand when a creature has no mind at all, even after all this time.”

“But, semantics. I’ve done all I can, _given_ all I can, and all I can now do is watch it play out. It wouldn’t be right of me to nitpick at this stage.” Monomon sighed and looked back at them hesitantly. The movement felt wrong, coming from someone so certain and innately commanding.

Ghost wasn’t sure they cared. Monomon’s dismissive words, trivializing their and their sister’s entire lives, struck a discordant note in their void. She knew something, and they were sure they wouldn’t like what. The Dream Nail in their hand hummed as they gripped it.

“Little Vessel, before you kill me, do me the favor of listening to me teach. If you are truly empty then it matters not to you, and if not, then all is lost regardless.” She said, and past the confidence that left no room for opposition there was something teetering on the edge of anguish.

Ghost didn’t respond, which Monomon nodded gratefully for.

“I couldn’t tell a soul all I did while I was awake, but I think it right to tell you. It does, after all, concern you almost to the letter.” Monomon’s voice lilted up in wry humor, while Ghost’s void chilled with slow suspicion.

“You see, I knew better. I knew it wouldn’t work. I created the means to make the Vessels a reality, of course I would know.” She said with all the relief of a confession.

“A union of soul and the sheer manifestation of nothing, the collision of God and Void, hopes and regrets. Fire and ice, oil and water, it never should have worked. But it _did_ , and you,” Monomon laughed suddenly, an elated, terrified sound. “You are the result! Look at you, many hundreds of years later, stunted and small but _alive_! That is very much more than the average bug could boast. Oh, how I wish I could learn why. Is it your very nature preventing your death? Are you simply not enough of a living creature to die properly? Or is your inherent emptiness a remarkable advantage in such a world as we created? Truly, it could be anything, or nothing.”

“But be that as it may, by any measure you never should have been. Born of Root and Wyrm, we hollowed your egg and set it to fill within the Abyss. We did something terrible to you, godling, before you were even born. And here you are. And here I am.” She tapered off to a whisper.

“We never should have.” Monomon breathed. “It was such a challenge, and I never should have taken it up. I was so scared of what might be, so frightened to let my world slip through my grasp without tightening my grip to save it. I cared so much. I thought they only needed another perspective. That was all it ever took before, some mind not inherently of the Pale King’s to find a clever solution. And, Wyrm, when I _succeeded_! When I found a way where the Pale King himself hadn’t!” Monomon laughed again, thready and weak.

“But it wasn’t worth it. There was too much unknown, too many variables I didn’t even know the shape of. And taking a gamble on my own cleverness for the fate of the Kingdom… It wasn’t worth it.”

“I thought it might not work, near the end.” Monomon told them. “I knew it was a long shot, and I couldn’t ignore that anymore, not with the sealing so close. I convinced myself it was only a failsafe, only a completely excessive round of security so that nothing could ever come close to undoing our work. My work. Why,” She laughed humorlessly. “I even pressed the duty on my assistant. My dear Quirrel.”

“If there was going to be fallout, he wouldn’t be around for it and neither would I. Plans upon plans, all, selfishness upon selfishness.” Monomon murmured, nearly softly enough as though she’d forgotten Ghost was there, staring out into the dream’s hesitant distance.

“I gambled and I _lost_ , little Vessel. I am a woman of science, and I hedged everything on a gamble. What does that make me, now?”

She was quiet for a moment. “I think it makes me someone who knows a little more than before. Perhaps it is a betrayal to all the learning I stood for, but I believe I resent that. I regret it. I regret my foolishness, to rely on hope and sacrifice with nothing to back it up. I regret what I asked of Quirrel. After all, that final bid to keep him safe did something far worse. Now he’s much like you, I think.”

“Does this regret absolve me of my crime? I don’t think it does. And now I have given all I can to make up for it, and even that is only a shot in the dark. How little makes sense, when one deals with higher beings.”

“Oh, empty little thing. Will you make a better Kingdom for him? Will he live long enough to find out? Will _you_?” Monomon sighed.

And waited.

Ghost didn’t move. The stillness of dream sung on.

Monomon sighed, impatient and drawn with fear, with resignation. “Hm. I suppose we did manage one, then. Take your nail and cut me down, empty Vessel. I’ve said my piece. Go take your place in the Egg.”

Ghost clenched their fists.

Then they drew back the Dream Nail and ended Monomon’s dream.

They woke in Hornet’s lap, where she’d laid their head so that they wouldn’t wake up on the cold metal. Ghost thought of Monomon’s words, how she’d spoken so despairingly of their sister, how she’d spoken with such heedless cruelty of _them_ , regretful not for all that she’d done to Ghost and their siblings but only for that it hadn’t _worked_ , in the moment before the Hollow Knight screamed out once more.

Worsening, maddening pressure. In their head, in their chest. The Hollow Knight couldn’t think, couldn’t beg or plead. They couldn’t feel their arm anymore. Everything was heated to measures unbearable, wavering in the air so furious that if they’d eyes like a bug they would have cracked and melted from their face, and the heat as much physical as imagined as the Radiance spread through their mind, too, overtook their thoughts, turned them to anger like her and vicious, triumphant vengeance that made what little was left of their void turn over on itself sickeningly.

There was a crack in their mask, there had been for days uncountable, but now they couldn’t forget it. Not when it cracked further still and groaned and pulsed with agony and every drip of boiling gold to eke through was like their mind followed it out. The Radiance was within them, and she had hollowed them out to a thin, resisting shell.

The seals were breaking. The Hollow Knight stood alone, with but one more keeping hold with them. There was change in the air, and the Radiance was crazed with excitement.

Ghost woke up.

Hornet wasn’t carefully quiet like she’d been before, shouting with vigor at something over their head, though she had a protective hand on them still. The haze faded a little faster this time, and Ghost wondered if it was because they were getting used to it, or if the Hollow Knight simply didn’t have the strength to call out as strongly anymore. The thought hurt. Ghost curled into Hornet’s shawl and cried.

The shouting abruptly broke off, though someone else said something that sounded quiet and derisive even to Ghost’s headache.

Hornet began to run a warm, soothing hand down their back, and then again, over and over while Ghost sobbed into her and twisted their claws tightly into the fabric at her front that draped partially over their mask.

Someone said something quiet, cut off sharply by another’s dismissal.

Hornet lifted them up and settled them securely against her, tucked their mask under her own and draped their unresisting arms over her shoulders, where Ghost clung weakly. She said something with a biting edge, parting words, and stood up with them. Ghost let her carry them away, unable to do anything but reel in the wake of the Hollow Knight’s pain.

Unable to think of anything but Monomon’s words. _Empty little thing._ It froze something in them to even think, the part of them that remembered the touch of the Void and the nothing of the Sibling’s eyes as they’d turned away to follow the Pale King.

But Hornet was so warm it nearly burned, vastly different than the Radiance’s intensity, and Ghost could remember the Abyss so clearly. The void they were made of, that Monomon had made them of, was chillingly cold. They shivered and Hornet held them tighter, nudged the side of their mask with her own as they drank in her warmth and the steady, solid pressure of her arms. It was grounding, soothing, safe. Ghost felt the fast beat of her heart thrum through her chest, hard and softened by her shawl, could hear her mumble quiet reassurances.

Hornet was stronger than they were, Ghost thought muzzily, and that too was a reassurance. Maybe they could beat her in a fight, but she was strong in a much more important way. The tears kept falling, though, dripping cold down their face and onto her shawl. They would save the Hollow Knight and they’d save Hallownest, but if they didn’t Ghost knew she’d be strong enough to know what mattered more than Ghost themself.

Monomon had been wrong about that, at least.

“-presumptuous scholar. Of course she’d say such and in the same breath demand improvement. What am I to do about it? I don’t control the rate the Hollow Knight dies. She’s lucky I don’t cut her down where she floats.” Hornet was whispering bitterly, her voice deceptively soft.

Yes, that seemed about right. It hadn’t been reassurances at all, only a string of muttered complaints and threats. It seemed so in line with what they’d come to expect of her that it was more reassuring than any gentle platitude, and Ghost pushed their mask deeper into the stiffer fabric of her neckguard until the dim lights of the Archives were only a faint, filtered glow.

Hornet cut herself off, all concern once again. “Are you alright? Was this the same as before, with the first Dreamer?”

Ghost wished with affectionate exasperation that she would stop asking multiple questions at once. They nodded once into her shawl, then again.

Hornet hummed thoughtfully. “Well, there’s only one left to contend with.” She said, and her grip on Ghost tightened almost uncomfortably.

Ghost was not made as a bug, exactly, and they knew they were fairly resilient to things like physical harm, so they delighted in the crushing closeness instead.

“Clingy little thing,” Hornet said with gentle amusement when they loosened a hand from her shawl and raised their head to scrub at the drying tears on their face, and then dove back into the dark warmth of her shoulder. It was a close mirror of what Monomon had called them, but while significantly more undignified it only made Ghost cling tighter, warding off their worries with Hornet’s calm and certainty.

“It’s a wonder I ever thought you a fierce, merciless warrior. You’re hardly intimidating, you know, cuddling like a grub. I was a standoffish creature when I was about your size. Though that was with exceptions, I suppose.” She told them. “It’s a good thing you’re very light, or I might not tolerate this so well.” She said without irritation. Her voice had an unnatural calming register about it, like she was trying to be soothing and coming off more judgmental.

It was working, though, if only to distract them from all they’d heard. And a distraction was what they needed.

“At any rate, Deepnest and my village aren’t more than a few day’s walk away. I haven’t been…” Hornet trailed off, her artificially casual tone dropping all at once as though she’d remembered something long forgotten, and the only sound was her steady steps on the metal floors of the Archives.

“I haven’t been home in a while. My people recognize me, but only just. It is painful to see them so.” She said lowly, like if another heard, they might kill her for the admittance. Or worse, think her weak.

Ghost thought of Hornet taken by the Infection, only herself by vestiges and fragments and the pale mask and red shawl her corpse might still wear, and shuddered at the thought as it crawled with pricking legs through their chest. Yes, it must be a terrible thing to come home and have those you loved bare their claws and look at you with eyes not their own, dead but not quiet.

Ghost knew that very well. Their family was much the same.

But why were they leaving so quickly? What had happened? Ghost squirmed suddenly in Hornet’s arms and she let them down, where they hurriedly dug out their new pen and some paper and flattened it on the floor to draw. Hornet crouched besides them and kept watch while they did so, though so deep beneath the rest of the Archives the halls were entirely uninhabited, the silence broken by only the occasional distant hiss of acid.

“Where,” Hornet read the single word aloud, and then squinted at their picture. “Quirrel?”

Ghost nodded, and Hornet’s eyes narrowed in distaste. “The scholar stayed behind with the D-“ Hornet cut herself off and made a dissatisfied noise. “With Monomon. I left under the impression that they were experiencing a reunion, and not an especially pleasant one. For all the Teacher’s cleverness, she said things that he took objection too, and I as well.”

“But,” Hornet hesitated, like she was loathe to say anything nice about Quirrel. “I think they were both mostly happy for the other’s safety. Quirrel didn’t seem as… He didn’t seem quite as sad.”

“And they’re scholars in a place of learning, they’ll find something trivial to distract themselves with soon enough.” Hornet dismissed.

Ghost thought a moment, and then wrote again.

“Is Quirrel okay?” Hornet read. “Yes, I think so. He was crying when we left.” She mused.

At Ghost’s alarmed look, she clarified. “Tears of joy, I think. He was smiling. An odd combination for that he was also actively giving her a piece of his mind, but he can do as he will. Does that satisfy you, or do you want to go back and ask him yourself?” Hornet asked like she sincerely hoped they would choose the former.

Ghost thought a moment, then nodded.

Hornet regarded them ruefully. “Yes to the first or second option? Hold up a claw.”

Maybe that would teach her to limit herself to one yes-or-no question at a time. Ghost held up a single claw to indicate that they thought leaving Quirrel to sort out Monomon and the complex implications Monomon’s words had implied for their relationship and her actions without further interference was probably the best course of action, or something like that. Ghost could tell they cared for each other, even though their own opinions about Monomon were confused and resentful at best, and they felt they’d done their part to give Quirrel, at least, the opportunity to be happy.

They had their own pressing issues, and Quirrel had all the time in the world to speak to Monomon. They only hoped they’d see him again, once it was all over.

“Good, just the thought of getting back in the middle of that is making my shell crawl. Let’s go.” Hornet said with open disgust.

As they left the Archives, following the twisting, hissing tunnels up from the depths of the cavernous lake, Ghost noticed that many of the lights had come back on, with more flickering to life as they went, and the sluggishly turning acid in the tanks had sped up like blood through quickened veins. And at the back of it all, Ghost felt as some buzzing, tentative power began to reach out like tendrils through the metal and the glass.

It reminded them uncomfortably of the way the Pale King’s seals had felt, but this power was different. It didn’t seek to implant itself and keep a cold guard, but to slip back into the empty, dark reaches of the Archives and run there like water through once-dry streambeds. It could only have been Monomon’s influence, and the Archives were suddenly alive with energy, twisting living through the air like calligraphy. Quirrel must have been right, Ghost thought wonderingly as they watched a curling line of it, white and glowing softly, connect to a terminal. The place felt much less abandoned, now that its minder was awake.

“I see she’s got the power grid functional again. That was quick.” Hornet commented. “With luck it won’t automatically shut the front gate before we can leave.”

Ghost thought that would indeed be an uncomfortable scenario, as the Archives felt less and less of an empty ruin and more a humming place of learning as the moments passed, and Ghost knew that they with their tattered cloak and bloodied nail didn’t belong in one of those.

Wasn’t it a nice thought, though? They’d always liked to learn. Maybe they could come back one day, cleaner and less on-edge, with less on the line. Ghost thought they’d like that.

“There isn’t much between the Fog Canyon and the furthest stretches of Deepnest, fortunately. Most efficient might be the descent to Queen’s Station, and then through Queen’s Station directly to Deepnest. I know of a shortcut there.”

Hornet cut them a sidelong look. “Which you won’t tell anyone else about, will you, Ghost? It would be a difficult, not to mention significantly longer, journey through the mantis’ land to go around.”

Ghost shook their head quickly, interested by what felt like a secret.

Hornet hummed in conspiratorial approval. “Good. Then let us go.”

As they left through the front gate along the bridge over the acid lake, a spark of power leaping from the metal did, in fact, slam the door behind them.

Hornet gave a short, harsh laugh. “I believe we made an impression. Perhaps we should give them some time before darkening their door once again.”

Ghost imagined that was probably more her fault than their own, but they hadn’t been aware enough when Hornet had been yelling whatever she’d said to Monomon to be sure, so they only shrugged and followed her. Though the idea of learning whatever knowledge existed within the Archives was an appealing thought when attached to Quirrel doing the teaching, but Ghost would rather not think about Monomon again for a while. Maybe never. The way she’d spoken of them and their siblings, like they were a means to an end, or worse, a failed, still interesting experiment, drove a discomfited chill up their back and made them feel faintly sick, bringing to mind the feeling of looking down into the Abyss and seeing, ever so distantly, the white carpet of bone below.

No, maybe they wouldn’t be back to the Archives for a while yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd like to be clear that Monomon never intended this to happen, and when she spoke to Ghost she didn't know they were anything but a perfect Vessel. Ghost is exactly the wrong person to see what she's done as anything but flatly black-and-white Bad. Monomon's work began, in the history of this specific fic that I've planned out in its entirety for no real reason but to have it for my own happiness, long after the Pale King had created his Kingsmolds and they'd proven to be "empty," and well into the early days of the Infection. Everything she'd worked for and everyone she loved was at stake, just like everyone else, only she thought she'd have a shot at saving it by helping create the Vessels. 
> 
> This is absolutely only my personal headcanon and how I've written my fic because I'm a sucker for drama, y'all keep on with your creativity!!
> 
> Also, would there be sharks somewhere in Hollow Knight land?? Who's to say, but Monomon's a really cool jellyfish who probably has a bug PhD or two so I suppose she'd know, if anyone.


	27. Still Deeper

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The descent to the final Dreamer, and a friend met along the dangerous roads.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Vague suicidal ideation (not from Ghost)

Outside the air was just as almost-fluid as they’d left it, and the jellyfish still floated peaceably. Ghost thought they had a new appreciation for them now, remembering the green-glowing smaller kin. They were sort of neat, once one got past the charged hum of electricity and the explosions.

Hornet led them away from the acid lake and the Archives like a squatting toad in its center, on a different path than the one they’d come from and then, as her words had suggested, nearly straight down where the earth dipped low, covered by much thicker vegetation than the way leading from above to the Archive’s grounds.

Ghost began to see greenery overtake the filmy bubbles and clear the purplish dreamy haze from the air as they descended from overgrown cliff ledge to crumbling, ivy-strewn balcony, but the jellyfish still kept their patient watch right up until they handed on the smooth, flat stone of an old walkway, bordered with still-functional lumafly lamps that lit gentle halos through the gloom, not more than an hour or two outside of the Archive’s ornate, eroded archways.

Ahead was a stone passage, still embroidered with iron lacing designs, with a lasting signpost sprouting from a patch of curling vines that indicated that it was a stag station.

Ghost bounded ahead into it, leading Hornet’s inexorable pace even as she growled a complaint as they brushed past her, something they decided was probably only because she wasn’t quite as excited to see the Stag as they were.

Inside the narrow, ivy-strewn entrance it looked much like the King’s Station in the City of Tears, strung with countless complex written signs from the ceiling and only dimly lit from the soft lumafly glow, and nearly as big and empty. But this one had a closer feel to it, less abandoned and washed out and more like it was waiting. That might have been due to the flowering bushes growing up from every deepening crack in the engraved stone, sprouting where they’d never been intended to and flourishing regardless, or else the distant hum of jelly fish only audible because they’d listened to it for so long, where the King’s Station’s only sound was the pounding rain and the echo of their own footsteps.

It was more like a greenhouse than a stag station, and a sedate, welcoming greenhouse at that, cooled by the moisture in the air and kept open enough by the inhospitality of the open stone to lack the claustrophobia of Greenpath. The thought came, as Ghost wandered past its chained off and broken entrances to the stagways, that it might be a nice place to meditate, like Oro had taught them.

Even with the distance they had covered from the Archives they still felt unsettled, and Monomon’s words along with the haunting orange eyes of every Infection-crazed corpse lurked like vengeflies at the back of their mind, waiting for any moment their guard might fall. Maybe it was better, then, that there was no time to sit and think.

At last Ghost saw a single open, unobstructed station entrance and dashed inside, barely slowing down before they drew their nail and struck at the resilient metal bell, producing a clamorous ringing that they thought with satisfaction might echo through all the stagways in Hallownest.

And as expected, just as Hornet caught up to them, the Stag came barreling down the path to greet them.

“Ah, little Ghost!” The Stag exclaimed to see them. “You’ve brought me to one of my favorite stations. Such adventurous sorts came through this place for the days in which it was a bustling hub, and now you take your place among them. You’re quite the explorer to find it.”

Ghost glowed for the compliment, however unearned, and Hornet spoke up dryly behind them. “Quite. It’s not been long, but how goes Dirtmouth? Is it still intact?”

The Stag chuckled unexpectedly. “Oh, you stirred up quite the hornets’ nest, if you’ll pardon my humor. That strange tall traveler you brought them is already something of a local favorite, from what dear Myla tells me. They’re all half in love with his artistic prowess, I hear. They’d like him to paint the outsides of all the houses, but such dyes are not common.”

Hornet sighed impatiently. “Yes, I’m glad, but is it _safe_?”

“Safe? Aah, I imagine nowhere in Hallownest is truly safe, but no harm has come to them. Why do you ask?” The Stag rumbled, tilting his grand head some to look up at her from a single dark eye.

“The Infection has spread. Have you not noticed its growing reach?” Hornet asked sharply.

“I travel only within the stagways, and even then I await for the call of the bell as my cue.” The Stag told her simply. “If there has been upset, I may well be the last to know.”

Hornet nodded tersely and turned to go without another word. Ghost patted the Stag’s horn quickly in thanks, to which he rumbled a pleased goodbye, and followed her away.

They wished they could have stayed and talked to him, somehow, in spite of their hurry. They hadn’t gotten to see the house Lurien had picked out, or even say goodbye, and Ghost would be lying if they said they weren’t also worried about the little town far above. It seemed impossible that it could be so close to the Black Egg Temple and be yet untouched by the Infection, but then, they’d only felt the Infection at all once they’d come down the well the first time.

So Ghost was only glad, more happy than they’d thought they could be before they’d even opened the Black Egg, that Dirtmouth and its inhabitants were safe, that anywhere in Hallownest was safe even now. Somewhere untouched by heated orange and anger to keep safe, and return to when it was over. And it was a little funny, they thought, that the town they’d judged so harshly upon first meeting it would mean so much to them now.

So they let its memory buoy them as they paced after Hornet, making her way with purpose to the other end of the vast, crumbling remnant of an older Hallownest.

The station was large, but not more than a few minutes’ walk one side to the other. It was at that end of a hall off of the main station platform, where with a quick flash of her needle Hornet cut down a sheet of vines obscuring a crack in the wall, narrow but deep, that Hornet spoke again.

“If the Infection has not found us here and has not harmed the town above, perhaps the Hollow Knight is holding up better than I’d imagined.” She said thoughtfully.

Ghost shook their head slowly, something she missed as she peered into the hidden path’s beckoning dark, listening carefully to the soundless depths.

“At any rate, there is no reason to slow now. I believe myself enduring enough to pass through Deepnest. Would I be inaccurate to assume the same of you?” Hornet asked over her shoulder.

Ghost shook their head again, quicker this time, and Hornet saw this time and responded with an approving nod of her own.

“Good. I hope you are not perturbed by close, dark places. I believe I once promised to show you my home, and the time has come for me to make good on that. Stay behind me and do not draw your nail unless we are directly attacked.” Hornet instructed. “You still have the lumafly, yes?”

Ghost did. They brought it out, fortunately still whole and glowing for its time in their possession.

“Keep it at hand. Deepnest is a very dark place, and the shadows tend to confuse the mind.”

And with that she wedged herself into the crack, carefully angling her horns so that they wouldn’t scrape the rough-edged stone, and was swallowed by the dark. Ghost followed after, and as soon as they’d stepped in as well the lumafly reactively glowed brighter until they could see it reflected in her dark eyes, pinpoints of light dancing amongst shades of grey.

“This way will soon open into a cavern, but first we must make the climb down. It is quite fortunate that the way is full of easy handholds, and that you are so small. It will make the narrower parts easier to bear.” Hornet observed as they followed the sharp-edged, unlit path down and the floor of it, jagged and uneven, suddenly dipped ahead.

The rest of Hornet’s shortcut made Ghost grateful, for once, for their size. The formation, more likely a narrow erosion in the dense stone Hallownest was built upon than a way carved by claw or tool, hadn’t been created with travel in mind, and while it was only just large enough for Hornet to squeeze through in places, Ghost was never too tightly confined to hold the lumafly for light.

The descent rapidly became a sheer, heady chimney of a drop that went on long enough that Ghost began to wonder if they would climb all the way down to the Abyss before it abruptly leveled off and the path opened up dramatically. It was still dark enough that beyond the sphere of pale light the lumafly let off Ghost could only see the shapes of things, jutting stones silhouetted in black and the curve of the path ahead, but now at least it curved back into something nearly flat.

“Deepnest is a sprawling, largely unmapped place. It is far larger than Hallownest ever knew, and goes far deeper than it could ever dream.” Hornet told them as the journey got easier. “Much of it shifts over the ages, ground through by claws and teeth and resettling and clawed open again, paths made and remade by generations of dirtcarvers and garpedes and spiders. Even I know not how far it reaches, or exactly its deepest tunnel.”

“But it is my home, and I suppose it is only right that I go back to it now. There is little left of the people I was born to, though.” Hornet said tersely. “I do not know how they will take to you. Perhaps what little of their minds remain will carry enough loyalty to their princess to spare you their fangs, or perhaps I shall have to cut them down for their faithful defense.”

“It matters not. We are here.” Hornet said, and Ghost realized that at some point the solid stone beneath their claws had turned looser, compacted and firm but in many parts, many shards of stone and dirtied chitin alike and cool, damp earth, all packed into a more unsteady road than they were accustomed to.

And far ahead came a high, chattering click of mandibles, the warning of chitin shifting roughly over chitin as its bearers shifted beneath the dark.

“I don’t think you will have much trouble with the wilder creatures of Deepnest, which vexed us even long ago, but do not show any fear. Do not stumble. Nothing that might be taken as weakness.” Hornet told them steadily. Her stride, already confident and sure, had taken on an evenness and a purposeful weight that it hadn’t had before.

Ghost nodded at her back and kept their senses alert.

The chittering only grew louder, joined in its chorus by countless other threatening jaws, and the tunnel they followed split and fractured into countless paths, which Hornet seemed to choose from at random and Ghost couldn’t differentiate between save that some led up more so than ones that led down.

Something hissed viciously up ahead, the sound rising and falling with the many-bodied clatter of chitin, and a creature emerged from the gloom, low to the ground and many-legged and many-eyed, the light in Ghost’s hands shining along the wicked curves of its snapping jaws.

Without hesitation Hornet drew her needle and stabbed it through the head, cracking through the shell and embedding the tip in its brain and then in the churned earth below. She withdrew it just as quickly and slung it back across her shoulders where it usually hung.

“A dirtcarver. A simple beast that tends to travel in packs and reproduces extremely quickly. Common prey. I am loathe to leave it lying here, but others will find the meat quickly enough. I shall let you kill the next, if it is also alone. Are you hungry?” Hornet asked, only turning her head enough to catch their quick nod and then returning her full attention to the tunnel ahead.

“Good. If I am right, then in the absence of the spiders and the more intelligent tribe of Deepnest, the simpler beasts will have proliferated. It is unusual to find one so close to the outskirts. There may be need for your nail yet.” Hornet said with amusement.

Ghost bobbled their head appreciatively, which Hornet didn’t see, focused as she was on choosing their next path.

And so they continued for what must have been hours, following tunnels dug into tight curves and steep angles, going inexorably downwards with every step.

Even Ghost’s feet were beginning to ache when Hornet indicated that they take what looked like a dead end, that she came up to the back of where the earth reared up from the tunnel floor to meet the matching soil above, and gave the apparently solid wall a single, forceful kick.

The dead end collapsed into the open, air rushing into the tunnel where it had been unmoving. Hornet didn’t seem bothered by how the tunnels had curved and twisted until Ghost was uncertain if they were beneath Hallownest at all, or even by how the air had grown progressively staler. More than unbothered, she’d seemed… Sharper, somehow. More aware, though she was ever unobservant. Her eyes caught the light and shone harsh and deep in her face, and her shoulders were squared and certain, and now as she led them from the tunnels the softer light beyond returned her to something like normal, deadening her sharp edges.

Hornet turned to them and it was almost a shock to see something besides command in her pale face, softened back to something they recognized.

“Come, and we’ll take a short break before we tackle the more dangerous, determined paths of Deepnest, ones that rarely shift and were, years ago, fiercely defended.” Hornet told them, and Ghost was again surprised to hear that her voice was rough like she was tired, though nothing like tiredness existed in her otherwise. Hornet leapt neatly away before they could make sense of it, dropping into the light.

Ghost jumped after her, and as their eyes adjusted to the relatively lifted gloom they saw that this cavern unexpectedly looked much like one of the City’s storerooms, complete with Hallownest bugs lying dead and dried in the corners and propped against a wrought-iron bench, built up on a raised platform like the ones that separated layers of the City’s infrastructure. The cavern was almost unimaginably open after hours and hours in the tunnels, and at the far end was what looked like the massive arch of a tramway.

They were too disoriented to consider where exactly it might have led, and knew little enough about trams in the first place, but it looked like the beginning of a tramline, not an end.

There must have still been far to go.

“We will rest here a few minutes, little Ghost. This is one of the last marks of Hallownest’s influence within Deepnest; its failed tramway.” Hornet said and collapsed on the creaking old bench with a tired sigh. Ghost padded up and sat next to her, tilting their head curiously.

She tilted her head back to recline fully against the ancient iron, eyes closed and horns pointed towards the floor below, and sat like that for a minute or so, breathing slowly and deeply.

Ghost understood with a start that the only reason Hornet was allowing herself to relax at all out in the open like this was because Ghost were there, too, trusting in them to guard her while she rested. Hornet had kept watch for them countless times, and at some point she’d come to trust them enough to allow them to do the same for her. Ghost felt any tiredness of their own fade before the enormity of the task and drew their nail slowly so as not to alert her, laying it across their lap and carefully scanning the cavern and where it dipped and opened back into Deepnest for any danger.

All was quiet, almost unnervingly so after the constant chatter of the tunnels, and the air was still. Ghost hoped it would stay that way, if only to let Hornet have a brief respite.

“Forgive me, I’d forgotten how trying it is to navigate Deepnest’s depths, particularly these wilder tunnels never truly home to my people.” Hornet mumbled to the ceiling. “One must be extremely alert within them, lest they fall to a foolish mistake. I must have led us past a dozen pitfalls that each might have ended our lives.”

Ghost hadn’t noticed any such thing, and were suddenly extremely glad they had their sister to guide them. All the tunnels had looked the same, and though they thought back to what they’d seen of its rough-hewn floor, they couldn’t pick out any moment where it had looked less than stable.

Hornet huffed a soft laugh and brought her head back up, reopening her eyes. “It’s a wonder that this place was never retaken by the beasts. I wonder what stopped them?”

“Might’ve been me,” Someone piped up down below the platform they sat on.

Hornet jolted to her feet with a screech, drawing her needle in the same movement, and Ghost vaulted off the bench to join her, their own weapon in hand.

“Whoa! Hold on, no need to be startled. I’ve been here the whole time, I thought you knew.” A beetle poked her covered head up over where the Hallownest-stone edge fell down to the compact earth below and waved sheepishly.

“What business have you here?” Hornet demanded, the words sharp and cutting.

Ghost couldn’t believe that they hadn’t noticed the beetle earlier, but then, they also could hardly believe Hornet hadn’t either. If they had to guess, they’d say she was probably thinking the same. They’d seen enough varieties of their sister’s endless anger to know that Hornet was more embarrassed than anything else.

“Aha, not terrible much now, really.” The beetle laughed uncomfortably. “Just taking a quick breather before I find my way out. Don’t you know, this place is just swarming with deadly sorts. Dreadful. A bit much for me, if I’m to be honest. Ah, but my name’s Cloth. Yours?” Cloth said and picked up a massive shellwood club from where it must have rested on the ground out of sight, hefting it to rest over her shoulder.

Hornet bristled. “Hornet. I would suggest that you leave before the ‘deadly sorts’ take offense to your carelessness.”

“Oh. Is this your home?” Cloth backpedaled. “I mean, it‘s not for me, but the place _has_ got an interesting atmosphere. Rustic. Exciting. I’m looking for excitement, mind you, just not with quite so many… Legs. Nice place to live, I’m sure, not a good way to die.”

“No. It’s not a nice place to live anymore.” Hornet said ominously. “And a worse one to die.”

Cloth gave an awkward laugh. “’Course, ‘course. Ah, what’s their name, the little one? Your kin, is it?”

Hornet lowered her needle an inch and glanced over at Ghost, who had already put theirs away. “Their name is Ghost. I ask that you leave before I make you.” Hornet threatened, narrowing her eyes at Cloth so that the beetle ducked partially back behind the platform edge.

Ghost tugged at her shawl, and she whipped her proud head around to direct her glare down at them instead. Ghost looked up at her and gestured to Cloth, and then the bench.

“You can’t be serious,” Hornet hissed plaintively. “What could you possibly want with her? We have to go. We have more than a day’s travel at the least, assuming we encounter no unexpected roadblocks.”

Well, if so, then they’d need more than a few moments’ rest. Or Hornet would, Ghost had killed plenty of dirtcarvers on the way and felt more than ready to take on another leg of the journey. And it felt wrong to force Cloth out into Deepnest, which Hornet herself had a hard time keeping up with for long, when they could just coexist in the same general area for a while and then depart on their respective adventures.

Ghost nodded firmly, and gestured again to the bench.

“Much obliged, little adventurer! I’m a smidge big for a bench, but I’ll just keep cozy down here and take some rest. Those awful biting, burning, scratching creatures have me aching and weary.” Cloth called up from below. “How did you two get all the way down here, if you don’t mind my asking? Awfully deep for such little things.”

“Our business is none of your concern.” Hornet replied, still miffed. But she sat back down on the bench and only glared at Ghost like she couldn’t believe they’d made her be nice, _again_.

Ghost was only gratified that she hadn’t started a fight because she’d been caught off guard, and patted her shawl about where they thought her elbow was appreciatively.

Hornet narrowed her eyes and tucked her legs up under her, laying her needle across her lap.

Well, defensive but peaceable was friendly enough.

“Okay, okay, no need to be defensive. Just thought you might be adventurers too. I’ve met plenty a little adventurer in my time. Why, I’m only here to begin with to find a grand challenge to overcome, to prove my courage!” Cloth bellowed.

“What you will find in Deepnest is a war of attrition, not glory. Any one dirtcarver will not be your downfall, but they will wear you down and pick bites from your exhausted shell once their numbers overwhelm you.” Hornet predicted grimly.

“Which is why I’m going to search out a different challenge!” Cloth said cheerily. “One less terrifying than that!”

Ghost crept to the edge of the platform and peered down at her. Cloth blinked back up at them, and waved with good humor. They waved back.

“Kindly little thing, aren’t you? I appreciate the good word you put in for me with, oh, your sister?” Cloth guessed.

Ghost nodded an affirmative.

“Your sister, then! Such a prickly soul, just like those creatures down here. Looks handy with that needle-”

“I am.” Hornet called from out of sight.

“- An accomplished warrior indeed! What about you, little ghostly adventurer? Are you a warrior as well?” Cloth asked, propping up an elbow against her massive, bloodied club.

Ghost nodded energetically, and drew their nail to wave it down at her.

Cloth nodded sagely. “Small, but sharp. A ferocious little stinger. I’m sure you’d cut down as many, ah, dirtcarvers as found their way to you.”

Ghost nodded once, meaningfully, and put away their weapon once more.

“Good to meet you, then, tiny warrior. Are you down here for a challenge, too? You’ve got that strong look about you.”

Ghost shook their head.

“Business, then. Understandable. Could never stand the structure of a settled life, myself. Was just me ‘n-“ Cloth broke off.

She gave a low, huffing laugh that turned into a tired sigh. “To tell the truth, little warrior, I’ve lost all my bravado down here. Tired and hurt and without much to show for it. It’s enough to dismay anyone, right?”

Ghost shook their head fervently, and gestured down at her club.

“Ah, ‘course I still got my good ol’ bug-thumper. But I think I’m getting tired in a different way, you know? I tried to keep on, but it’s just not the same now.” Cloth said unhappily. “I’m not used to covering for myself, I keep losing battles. And it’s… It’s all sort of useless, isn’t it?”

Ghost slid down from the platform to sit next to her on the chilled, faintly damp unsettled earth and waited for Cloth to go on.

“I mean, I lost my best girl. My Nola. My gal. We’d been together a long time!” Cloth laughed weakly, but when she spoke again her words were dull and very soft. “And nothing’s right without her. It’s why I’m here, everyone says that when you go down to Hallownest you might not come back. I’m just hoping there’s a good fight at the end of it.” Cloth muttered.

“Nola wouldn’t want you to spend your life on a fool’s errand.” Hornet said from above, where she’d at some point come to stand at the edge. She jumped down to land gracefully besides Cloth and looked down at her without anger, but with something like understanding.

“Sometimes it’s all we can do to keep going, even when all is lost. Do you think she’d like to see you get yourself hurt down here, in this cruel place?” Hornet asked quietly.

“I- No, Nola was always onto me about takin’ better care of m’self.” Cloth mumbled, claws fidgeting with a small splinter on her club. “She wanted to settle, one day, once we’d gotten rich and won a bunch of good fights.”

“What do you hope to accomplish, then?” Hornet continued.

“… I don’t know. One last good fight. Then I’ll go see Nola again. I won’t be hurt or anything then, nothing for her to complain about.” Cloth tried for joking, but it came out weak and fell heavy into the silence of the long-abandoned tramway’s wet stone.

Hornet gazed down at Cloth with sad, dark eyes, but Cloth wasn’t looking at her, just running a palm over her club over and over.

“Death is always waiting,” Hornet said at last, her voice soft and low. “And there is always value in life, even if you can’t see it. Even if you can see it, but can’t believe it. That is where courage lies; to look for that value when it is hard to see.”

Cloth sniffled, and rubbed at her eye through her hood. “You really think so? It’s so lonely, now.” She said.

“Yes. It is.” Hornet agreed. “And yes, I do.”

Cloth was silent then, mulling it over. Then she stood up stiffly and hefted her club. “Okay, I’ll give it another go. You seem like a smart bug. Nola was always the smart one, so I guess I’ve got to be the stubborn one. I think she’d have liked you, though. You’re just that sort of prickly.” Cloth said, her voice thick with tears but light in spite of it.

Hornet angled her head down as though unsure whether to be offended or not. “Thank you.” She decided tentatively.

“You know any place to rest a while? I think I’ll keep out of fights for a time.” Cloth said with a slightly embarrassed, wet laugh.

Hornet nodded, uncertainty gone. “Travel to Dirtmouth. The bugs there are kind and have plenty of room for good company. As you may have noticed, Hallownest is not especially densely populated. You should have your choice of houses to rest within as long as you please.”

Cloth tilted her head, and Ghost got the impression she was smiling behind her hood. “I knew you were a good sort. You two want a hug?”

“No, thank you,” Hornet said at the same time Ghost threw themself at her, and Cloth caught them with a resounding, heartfelt laugh.

Cloth squeezed them so tight Ghost thought their mask might pop off, and they did their level best to return the favor, prompting another wet laugh. Cloth took a deep, shaky breath, and let it out slowly. Then she set them carefully down and took up her club once more.

“If either of you ever need a half-decent hand to help in a fight, come find me. Just not too soon, huh?” Cloth boomed vigorously, as though she could bulldoze over how she was still scrubbing at her eyes through her hood.

“We appreciate the offer. Take care.” Hornet said stiffly.

Ghost waved at her, and Cloth waved back, and then she strode purposefully over to the mouth of a tunnel leading below and jumped down into it.

“Ah, good,” Hornet murmured. “That’s the right way out. I was worried I’d need to show _her_ to Dirtmouth, too. I can’t believe you, little Ghost.” Hornet looked down at them in half-baffled amusement. “You’ve made me soft.”

Ghost nodded their head in happy, slightly smug agreement, and Hornet shoved lightly at their mask admonishingly even as she turned away.

“We may as well be off, then. I doubt I’ll be resting much more, and Deepnest is wide. We may yet reach our destination in good time if we hurry.” Hornet said harshly, undermined by the smile in her voice.

She was right to smile, Ghost thought. It wasn’t often a first meeting with anyone at all ended without bloodshed or harsh words. They liked Cloth, and they thought Hornet did, too. And with any luck, they’d see her in Dirtmouth sooner rather than later.

They looked forward to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everyone lives! Everyone! And Cloth is probably one of my favorite minor characters, I just couldn't be mean to her. In fact, she gets the benefit of the nicest Hornet's probably ever been to anyone she'd just met. She'll make it up to Dirtmouth just fine, probably stop by Sheo's on the way to bond over giant weapons and have the first of a long line of Saturday meet-ups to paint with Vigor and Bravery!
> 
> Also, apparently her club is a tooth. I went back to read her wiki page again and somehow I'd completely missed that. Chalk that particular inconsistency up to AU nonsense. 
> 
> Sorry about the delay, I'm alright! Also, sorry that I'd lied about having two weeks' sets of chapters ready to roll, what caused me to take a week before this bunch ended up taking a lot longer and a lot more effort than anticipated, and internet is still patchy. Yet we're very close to the end, now, so thank you for sticking with me so far. Stay safe!


	28. The Spiders' Labyrinth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even Hornet fears the treacherous roads of Deepnest, though not for the same reasons as many.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : None.

So they set off again. Hornet led them down a tunnel leading opposite from the way Cloth had gone, impossibly deeper than they’d come, but as the hours passed and the chittering, scraping, scuttling depths began to level out into coherent paths, lined with spiders’ silk and more solidly formed of stone and ancient, compressed carapaces than tunneled earth, Hornet began to get twitchy.

That was the only way Ghost could describe it. She didn’t seem nervous, only more intent than before. Her head seemed on a swivel, constantly scanning and jerking towards closer sounds that might resolve into a threat, but rarely did.

Ghost began to realize that they hadn’t seen a dirtcarver in some time, though the skittering and shrieking hadn’t quieted in the least. Their only obstacles had been untrustworthy walls and poorly compacted floors that crumbled into nothing, or worse, buried stalagmites and gleaming crystal shards, sharp as nails.

And then Hornet gave a soft gasp and crowded them behind her with a quick sweep of her arm, the other raising to the handle of her needle. Ghost peered around the folds of her shawl, and ahead in the dark, confined tunnel, they saw six eyes gleaming orange in the darkness. They were distanced startlingly far apart from each other, proportioned such that Ghost wouldn’t have thought that the body belonging to a head that size would have fit in the narrow, low-roofed tunnel. Yet there it was, chittering deep and slow as though the mandibles were simply too large to meet quicker, the sound rising and falling in waves, and the being only knowable by its infected gaze dragging itself with a low, constant brush of a heavy body over stone towards them.

“A devout, loyal to Herrah the Beast and, once, to me as well.” Hornet said, her voice hushed. “One of my tribe, a protector. Stay behind me so that I might not have to kill them. They still serve their purpose, infected as they are.”

The devout crawled closer, and its chittering took on a high, angered note, losing the measured pace of clicking mouthparts in exchange for becoming faster, more uncontrolled, and quieter like the noise itself was lurking to strike. Hornet didn’t twitch, and Ghost ducked back behind her.

The chittering deepened again and, as the moments passed, slowed to the occasional click of mandibles.

“Yes, you know me, and I you. You needn’t protect from me, loyal one.” Hornet murmured. “Allow me to pass.”

The devout didn’t move.

Hornet reached behind and grasped for Ghost. They gave her their hand and she held it crushingly tight.

“You are loyal, aren’t you, defender, guardian? To Herrah and her child?” Hornet tried again, threading steel through her voice.

Ghost heard the devout chitter lowly, slow and confused, and then the tap-crunch of its many legs digging into the earth below, and the different drag of its compact body, that while they couldn’t see it had to have been immense, over the same as backed away. Hornet waited until it had passed some barrier, long after Ghost couldn’t hear the scratch of its claws any longer, something that didn’t echo as it should have. She held them close behind her, pulling them along as she took careful steps towards it, speaking all the while as one would for a frightened, dangerous beast.

“You have done well, protecting as tirelessly as you have,” She told it. “You do Deepnest proud. I thank you for your service.”

The devout chittered again, uncertain, and there was a fast whistle like a blade through the air, and something large enough to shake the ground dug with a deafening grinding noise into the broken stone before them. Ghost tensed as the air it displaced so suddenly ruffled through Hornet’s shawl and the strands of their cloak, knowing it had to have had inches to spare before it would have cut them both down, but Hornet’s hand clenched impossibly tighter around theirs, bending the flexible chitin nearly to the point of snapping, and she held them fixed in place.

“Do not think to attack me.” Hornet said, and the calming quality to her voice was replaced with cold threat.

The devout gave a shrill, whistling shriek like a nail drawn over rusty iron and whatever had embedded itself withdrew with a grating wrench, and the guardian hauled itself hurriedly back away from them.

Hornet kept herself facing the devout until they were long past it, her hand locked around Ghost’s and her posture as rigid as her needle, edging around the morosely clattering devout that, as they peered around her, was slowly scraping massive halves of what must have been its mask and forelimbs combined over its true face, too dark to make out and only shedding gleams and instants of heated flaming glow past its working arms. It shook itself as it pulled one, then the other masked limb over its face, as though it was hurting and dazed, and even with space and Hornet between it and Ghost, they could still feel the feverish heat of the infected creature.

Hornet never looked away from the devout even as it lost itself in pitiful chirrups and low, wavering shrieks, treading slowly backwards instead of walking straight ahead where the tunnel continued as Ghost tried to keep out from underfoot. Only once the shifting orange shafts of escaped light past the devout’s mask had faded entirely into the dark, the glow of the lumafly Ghost still held in one hand the only remaining illumination, did Hornet turn away.

There she stopped and let out a tense breath.

“It is unpleasant to see how far they have fallen.” Hornet said without looking down at them, loosening her grip on their claws just enough that the growing ache began to abate. “I will take us along paths I think will not hold so many. The devout recognize me on some level, which bodes well for whoever else we may encounter, but even so, they have become more aggressor than defender. I will not cut down any more than I must. We will need to be very careful.”

‘Careful’ turned into nearly another full day by Ghost’s best guess of creeping through the warrens and burrows of Deepnest, through miles and miles of winding tunnels where Hornet had to keep a guiding hand on their mask to direct them down thread-thin paths as she hid them from the little crawling orange-eyed spiders clinging to long, elaborate webs and screeching when they came near, only reluctantly allowing Hornet to pass.

And sometimes they didn’t. Even when Hornet stood firm and spoke to them gently, many still lost themselves to their mindless, fixed anger and lunged at her, and Hornet had to drive her needle through their soft carapaces, dripping orange to the web below and dying with alternatively soft and plaintive or furious shrieking.

Ghost realized eventually why the sound was so unsettling. It was nearly the same terrible noise Hornet made when something startled her too badly to beat the gut reaction down. This understanding only made Ghost’s void twitch with reflexive anxiety whenever a deephunter made the noise in response to their approach, and it was only due to the nature of the void itself that they didn’t physically jump each time.

And then, all at once, the narrow tunnels opened up into somewhere that felt wide and open, the air humid and cold and smelling of wet stone.

Hornet breathed a real sigh of relief, and finally let go of Ghost’s hand. They edged around her as she leaned an arm against the nearby wall and lowered her head some, eyes drooping half-closed in the calm and quiet broken only by the distant drip of water far below.

“The Distant Village, where I grew up.” Hornet explained dully. “Home, I suppose.”

Ghost glanced up at her worriedly, but she waved them off, so they looked out over the expanse.

Before them was a thin iron path wrought of the same metal as those from Hallownest, but much narrower and strung from a complex series of silk supports, each as thick around as Ghost’s arm and braided from many thinner strands. The iron itself was nearly entirely obscured by a thick layer of supporting silk, from which broken, greyed strands hung and fluttered down from the sides. It led out over a deep drop, that if Ghost peered over the side of, they could see, far below, the distant shattered reflection of light on water, a wide underground lake like a hungry maw. It looked too similar to the Void Sea to be entirely comfortable with, but the Void never gave up a glimmer of light that fell on it. Ghost tore their eyes away and reassured themself with that, as the familiar fear edged into their heart.

And above was the Village itself. Gargantuan structures like immense cocoons of some inconceivably huge moth, or the wrapped prey of some equally massive spider, suspended from the stone far above by countless taut strands that looked thin as a quill’s line in ink from so far away, but must have been immeasurably strong to hold up the Village for all this time.

They were clustered in a group, more than ten, Ghost thought, though from the smaller cocoons affixed to the sides of some of the larger there might have been yet more just out of sight. A village, the heart of Deepnest, the place Hornet proudly declared herself to be of. The thought made the dull greyish, silent village all the quieter, most of the chittering died away and the faint lap of the water below echoed a dozen times before it reached Ghost. It seemed abandoned, and lonely, but not in quite the same way as Hallownest.

Deepnest felt resentful.

“There will be devout within that we cannot avoid, and the halls are typically sized such that they can defend with efficiency. Prepare yourself. They may be more determined than the last.” Hornet warned.

Ghost nodded slowly, and was about to tug at her shawl for her to sit and rest a while, but Hornet pushed off from the wall and strode ahead without pause or hesitation, like she hadn’t been traveling for the better part of three days on constant, high alert. Ghost could only follow after her, her stride a little too long to comfortably keep up with, and hope for her sake that they wouldn’t find much difficulty inside.

Hornet marched up to the biggest of the suspended cocoons, looming the size of the first few floors of a City tower, or maybe twenty Dirtmouth homes all lumped together, tall and off-white in the gloom and waiting. The way within was framed with a carved stone arch, drastically dissimilar to comparative ones around Hallownest, shaped with jutting corners and proud curves that hung down like reaching claws, and Hornet didn’t falter at it before walking beneath it.

Ghost followed her, and stopped when she did at the scene within.

A half-dozen or more pale masks scraped dryly at chitin as they all turned as one to face the entrance, sometimes turning too far from the shoulders they sat on, each cloaked identically with faded red robes. Ghost and Hornet stared at them, and the masked villagers stared back.

“Greetings-“ One began, their voice like grating stone.

Hornet barked a harsh laugh. “Fools, take off the costumes. It’s me. There’s no prey here.”

The villagers slowed to unnatural stillness, and then the one who’d spoken took off their mask. It was almost viscerally shocking for a single moment, as Ghost had never in their life seen a bug take off their own mask before. Ghost knew that not all bugs’ masks were their face as well, but it was often so hard to tell which was which that their gut reaction was alarm, as though the bug had calmly reached up and detached their arm.

But beneath the dry mask was another, one many-eyed and blinking. “Princess?” They asked hazily, orange playing in fluttering curls over the dark of their eyes.

“Yes. Tell me, has this ploy ever actually worked?” Hornet asked unkindly.

“Well… Yes. It has. More often than you’d think.” Another piped up. “Hallownest bugs are not clever.”

“Or maybe just a little too trusting.” A third added.

“Whatever the reason, they’re usually more than happy to catch themselves in web. The devout are always hungry.”

“I imagine so. I suppose if a Hallownest bug gets this far, they’re a danger irrespective of their intentions. Though I would ask that the next time it happens, you direct the matter to me instead of… Eating them.” Hornet instructed.

“But Princess,” One objected.

“We’re so hungry. Princess, it has been so long since you’ve been home,” Another sighed, taking off their own mask. Behind it, their eyes, too, were gleaming a faint orange.

Hornet flinched as though struck, and every villager in the room zeroed in on it. Their eyes flared bright like flames, and the nearest one hissed. Hornet rallied, her eyes flashing in the low light, and hissed back.

“Enough!” Hornet shouted. “You will do as I tell you! You will not slaughter Hallownest bugs, I will not allow it.”

Some of the brilliance faded from the villagers’ eyes.

“That will not be difficult. There have been none in years.” The first chittered around the words.

“Can’t leave to hunt. Stay, protect Queen.” Another slurred.

“Go hunt. The dirtcarvers are many and fat at our borders. I will protect her in your absence. Call the weaverlings and deephunters to leave as well, and do not return until every spider is fed.” Hornet commanded. “I will not have needless suffering fester among my people.”

“But, Princess,” One protested.

Hornet drew her needle and leveled them with its point and her narrowed eyes, equally biting and exact. “Hallownest has fallen. There is nothing to defend from but our own hungers, and the beasts in our tunnels. Are you doubting my ability to serve as guard of my own nest?”

“No, Princess, never!” A villager gasped, their eyes flickering black and then again to dull, fiery orange.

“Then get out. I will not warn you again.” Hornet said coldly, and Ghost believed her.

So, apparently, did her half-Infected people, who shed their dusty robes and false masks and scuttled, many-legged and acquiescent, out from the hall. All save one, who hesitated at the door.

“Shall I instruct the devout to remain as they are? We will bring them prey, Princess.” They offered.

Hornet regarded them stoically. “Instruct them to lower their guard. I must see to my mother.”

The villager chittered in assent and hooked their limbs directly into the webbing of the wall, climbing up and into an opening in the ceiling Ghost hadn’t seen before.

Only then did Hornet nudge the back of their mask to encourage them to come out from behind her.

She gave a despairing noise. “I hadn’t known there were bugs yet living.” Hornet whispered. “I’d never have left if I had. And even so, they must be all that is left. Eight, nine? A handful more, scattered throughout the village, all more than half-mad? We were thousands strong.”

Hornet stared at where the last villager had disappeared above, and then down at Ghost. “And even as these few remain, they would have killed you had they noticed, so Infected were they. I would have had to slay them all. Come quickly, my mother’s chambers are this way.”

And she began to nimbly climb up the same way, just as quickly as she could have walked had the wall been horizontal. Ghost stared ruefully after her, and leapt up to try the climb themself. It turned out to be less difficult than it looked, the silken strands they grasped taut as an iron cable and equally strong, easily capable of carrying their weight. It still took several minutes to join Hornet, waiting impatiently at the top, and enter the corridors of Herrah’s nest properly.

The devout, just as Hornet had instructed, were already gone from the path Hornet took them along, neater kept and lit on occasion by webbed lumafly bulbs but still dark and dusty, never used with any frequency for years. They split and fragmented like so much of Deepnest seemed to, the perfect size for a devout to crawl through and defend and so confusing in their layout that even though Ghost knew that they were in a structure only the size of a few stories of a building, it felt much larger and more expansive.

Hornet passed through it as though she’d walked every path as regularly as she handled her needle, winding through the labyrinth and upwards in a two steps forward, one step back manner, every tunnel rounding back upon itself and every climb met with a descent, until she brought them to a hall that was illuminated by a soft glow at the end.

But just outside the next turn that promised to lead, finally, into an open room, Hornet stopped them with a sharp hand clenched suddenly over their shoulder. When Ghost looked up at her she was still as though frozen, standing statue-like and staring dead ahead, her eyes tight and drawn. She said nothing for nearly a minute, the faint candlelight shifting the heaviest shadows over her pale mask more than illuminating it. Then she looked down, avoiding their searching gaze, and swallowed, and took in a deep breath like she was about to do something she could scarcely comprehend.

“Little Ghost, I dread the answer, but I must ask you something.” She whispered, the words almost lost between the skittering in the webbed passages around and her own lowered voice, quiet like the delicate touch of a claw run over silk webs. “Long I have been unable to consider this, long I have made my peace with the inevitable outcome, such that the idea that it may prove unnecessary jars me to my core. And yet I cannot allow myself to be so cowardly as never to _ask_.”

“Little Ghost,” Hornet said again and looked at them with wide, dark eyes, burning with hope and crushed by an overpowering unwillingness to grasp blindly for what might never come. “Can you wake my mother, the Dreamer? Twice now you’ve done so with the others, hardly coincidence, but I ask you now and I _need_ you not to lie to me. Please, little Ghost, can my mother be spared?” Hornet breathed, her voice caught between pride and stoicism and the desperate, painful longing for a long-absent parent.

This must have plagued her for days, maybe even since they’d awoken Lurien and broken his seal over the Black Egg regardless. Hornet talked little of Deepnest or her mother, but what she did say was tense and carefully distant, like admitting how she was alone and the last of her home and her people to remain uninfected and awake wasn’t worth the cost. Ghost knew she cared deeply for her home, just by the almost reverent way she spoke of it when she did, and they knew from the beginning that she resented her mother’s sacrifice in the Pale King’s name, so long ago that she’d barely had the chance to know her.

And now Hornet was stiffening and turning away, her exhale shaking and choked but her posture as resolute as ever, mask held high as she nodded.

But Ghost nodded too, quickly, once and then again when she turned back to look. They knew they could, they _knew_ it. If there was any Dreamer they wanted not to kill, it was Herrah, and Ghost couldn’t bear the thought of their sister watching her mother fade away after all this time. Even the possibility of being the harbinger of that final blow made Ghost’s chest feel like it might cave in and crack under the weight of the harm it would do to Hornet, who only spoke of her when she had to and when she hurt too much not to.

Even if they hadn’t known they could simply awaken the Dreamers before, the way their sister stared at them in open wonder, in anxious hope, something they’d never seen her wear in any manner for any reason, was something they thought would have made them find a way regardless.

“Of course you can,” Hornet said stiffly after a single, long moment, turning her mask away and blinking rapidly. “It’s not as though my mother’s seal is any different from the others’. There’s no reason whatever you’ve done before shouldn’t also work now. I’m being foolish, fearing otherwise like a grub staring into the darkness that holds nothing but their own nest. Of course.”

She sniffed harshly and shook her head as though to clear it, and looked sharply down at them in what Ghost knew was only Hornet’s way of pretending she wasn’t upset. “Let us not drag this out, then. The Beast lies in the next room, and through her protection you must pass in order to reach that fated goal.”

Ghost drew the Dream Nail and held it still and sleeping at their side as she led them into the bedchamber without another word.

As with much of Deepnest, it was strung with carefully constructed webs and spun with the strongest silk of the spiders’ making, the walls nearly hidden by the layering of the weave. Against the farthest corner of the room lay a pile of wrapped bundles that could only have been ancient shells of prey, webbed and neatly stacked for the Queen’s awakening centuries since, and covered now with a thin layer of dust.

Dust twirled above them, swirling and heavy, made visible by motes dancing through the thin white light streaming in from above and in the melded warmth of all the mostly-melted candles lit throughout the room, hardly flickering in the unmoving air and their soft light glowing over Herrah’s unmoving carapace, washed-out grey in the weak overhead light and warmer where the candlelight struck.

Her mask and shroud-like cloak were in much the same style as Lurien and Monomon’s, but behind her pale mask and draped by her cloak were two high-arching horns, very alike to Hornet’s now that Ghost knew to compare. Where Lurien was spindly and Monomon uncanny, Herrah was powerful in build and imposing for it. Little wonder that the Queen of Deepnest had kept her land from the Pale King, if she was half as fierce in her rule as the cruel slant of the many eyes on her mask, if she was half as fearless and unrelenting as her daughter.

And if she had been anything like her daughter, Ghost thought they knew why she’d accepted to dream.

Under Hornet’s watchful gaze, standing far in a corner as though to prevent her own intervention, something Ghost knew that even if they had been here to kill Herrah, Hornet never would have allowed herself, Ghost drew back the Dream Nail and struck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I have Thoughts on how Deepnest might have worked, which would take a bit longer than the character count for chapter notes goes to talk about entirely, so the relevant bit is that for the purposes of this fic there were two major means of settling conflict in Deepnest; non-lethal fighting and posturing. Confidence was everything! As fighting is essentially out, if only because it's all but certain that it'll be lethal, Hornet's next option is the posturing, which theoretically she should always come out on top for, given that she's the Princess and all. 
> 
> There's no real physical danger a devout could pose to her, but, well, the infected denizens of Deepnest are the reason she hadn’t come back; the faces of her friends and family, even haunted and killed, aren’t ones she can easily destroy. And if she did, she’s almost more afraid she wouldn’t care anymore. She's grown callous to every other atrocity she's had to commit, and this one would be the straw to break the camel spider's back, so to speak.


	29. One Who Tried and Was Brought Low

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Herrah is awakened, and the final seal breaks.
> 
> Chapter Warnings! : Arguably the worst panic attack yet, angst, accidental harm to a loved one, guilt, mild gore, mild casual cruelty, very brief suicidal ideation, Herrah sets off Ghost's fight or flight reflex.

As twice before, the dream was the same cloud-shrouded place, nearly identical to those Lurien and Monomon had occupied, though now that distant fire, or perhaps the burning of an impossibly close sun, was brighter and redder. Ghost though that if only the grey, obscuring clouds moved or dissipated just enough, they might be able to see the source of the raging light.

But they didn’t, and so the dream remained hidden.

Herrah was there when they looked, limp and still and so tall that she might have been only lying in wait, for Ghost, from so close to the ground, couldn’t properly see her face past her bulk as more than a flash of white. Ghost gazed up at her a moment as the dream sang around them, filtering through the air like a muted sigh, and raised the Dream Nail once more.

They drew it back just as before, waited for the power to build until they thought the nail’s rounded handle might hum its way free of their claws, and cast a last silent plea that it work just as it always had.

And it did. When Ghost lashed it ahead at Herrah’s form it bit through the dream-seal exactly as it had before, with a resounding snap that they felt itch through their void more than heard.

And while they waited for the blinding light to dissipate from their vision, Herrah fell to the stone with force enough to stagger them, though the sound was different than they’d expected. Less of an impact and more of the reactive click of chitin.

And then in the next instant they were swept up and high above the ground, making their void swoop in a single startled lurch to feel the stone beneath their claws disappear, held up by a fistful of their cloak. Ghost frantically shook their head to clear their vision and was met by Herrah’s wide white mask, of a size with the other Dreamers’ but somehow bolder and sharper. They’d never seen it so close, held inches from their own, and now Ghost realized that it was nearly as tall as they were.

Ghost stared Herrah down as the unmoving, carved eyes of her mask bored into their own, equally empty and equally dark and just as ungiving. They didn’t move as she considered them, though their instinct was to draw their sharper nail and defend themself. The desire to bare their claws and fight surged high as they dangled and Herrah watched them, and they fought instead to tamp it back down.

The silence dragged on. And then Herrah broke it with a deep, harsh laugh, the sort that commanded attention without needing to be loud, resonating through Ghost’s mask. They quelled the urge to flex their claws, but Herrah was someone who struck them as an incredibly dangerous person, and Ghost felt vulnerable in a way they rarely did. It was a good thing she was so important to Hornet, something that blared constant through the forefront of their thoughts, or they might have acted on the mounting call to self-preservation that had kept them alive so long.

“If you’re the King’s chosen courier of bad news, he chose well. Such a fearless soul I’ve rarely seen.” She rumbled, though her mask never moved, and her head never shifted to tell them the danger was over.

“But that’s not what you are, is it, little one? Your eyes are far too black, and your body far too cold. You’re one of his own children, aren’t you, little void-born? Tell me, what else would he like to take this time? My nest? My people? Is my daughter to join me in dream?” Herrah said, her voice sliding from darkly amused to cold accusation.

Ghost shook their head slowly.

“Then what? Why wake me? I’ve already given all, what else is there? Unless…”

Herrah lowered them some and arched her head back, the movement fluid and precise, regarding them for a moment before she barked a booming laugh, grating and cruel, and threw them down.

Ghost couldn’t twist midair in time to land on their feet, thrown with too much momentum to do more than bounce once and scrabble to stop themself before they skid right off the stained stone platform, which seemed smaller and more constrained by the second. They stayed down, only rolling onto their belly and gathering their legs beneath them, and keeping very still as Herrah laughed and laughed.

“Oh, this is too much!” Herrah exclaimed, making a show of wiping a nonexistent tear from her mask as she shook with grim humor. “Too _much_! It failed, didn’t it? _He_ failed, didn’t he?” She chuckled as though the idea were overwhelmingly hilarious, the words disbelieving and mocking, and burst into slightly hysteric laughter again.

Ghost watched her silently, aware that if she chose to take it out on them then there was little they could do. They couldn’t leave her here, and they couldn’t fight back. They’d have to hope she wouldn’t, for Hornet’s sake. Ghost dug their claws into the cracked stone below.

“All that for nothing. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” Herrah realized, turning back to them. She looked down at Ghost and snorted with laughter once more. “Don’t look so defensive, little Vessel. There’s a hundred thousand of you, I’d accomplish nothing by destroying the one the Wyrm sent to my claws. What a brutally efficient tactic. I must applaud him, I’d thought he’d get tired of his emissaries coming back in pieces sooner or later.”

“Or perhaps there aren’t any of you anymore. Perhaps he’s run through all his tries, and you’re the last. So do tell me, mute little void hatchling, am I right? Did the Wyrm’s scheme come crashing down around him? Has Hallownest met that terrible fate he was so desperate to save it from?”

Like mother, like daughter, Ghost thought wryly. Always asking so many questions at once. Ghost nodded carefully.

“Hah! Serves the slimy little glowworm right. How long has it been, a year? Two? A decade?”

Ghost slowly shook their head.

“Longer? Two decades, a hundred years?”

Again they responded with a negative.

Herrah was silent, studying them. “Does my kingdom still stand?” She asked, her voice rasping and calm.

Ghost stared up at her and shook their head once more.

Herrah stood still, as statuesque as she had been before Ghost had awoken her. She didn’t seem lessened for the lack of animated, vicious energy, only like a coiled, waiting predator, patient and considering.

“Does my daughter still live?” She whispered finally, the quiet words nearly swallowed by the deepening rasp of what Ghost realized was emotion, in spite of the level way she spoke.

They nodded twice, quickly.

“She lives… Then there is something to fight for still.” Herrah told them. “I wonder if she remembers me. Though I suppose I’ll be forced to count that among the things I’ll never know, trapped in dream.” She growled.

“You are here to kill me, aren’t you, cold little child of the Void? And you must have already broken my seal, if I am awake enough to speak to you. Come close and see how well you fare.” Herrah snarled, and beneath the strands of her cloak Ghost saw her mandibles gleam in the muted light for a fraction of a second amidst the dark.

They shook their head hurriedly, and held up the Dream Nail’s handle.

Herrah cocked her head, eyeing it and them. “And is that supposed to save you, little one? A bladeless nail?”

“No,” She said suddenly, covering the space between them so quickly that Ghost nearly backpedaled off the edge, and might have if she hadn’t picked them up by the scruff of their cloak again and, with another hand, neatly plucked away the Dream Nail.

“No, this is of moths’ make. A dream sigil, but which? The moths used no weapons, though in dream they were insuperable. Oh, little Vessel, were you hoping for escape?” Herrah asked conversationally, turning the handle over in her hands.

“I may as well grant you it. I don’t think I will be long for the dream, if I am awakened now. The kingdoms must be devastated enough without another death to add to the pile, and if you would be so kind as to awaken me properly, I will need you to tell me all you know.” Herrah said reasonably and offered them the Nail. “Know that I will let myself fade before I allow your escape alone.”

Ghost took it back and, before she could drop them again, held it aloft to form its blinding blade.

But something was wrong. As they drew it back and held it there it warmed in their hand even as it hummed and grew bright, an uncomfortable, invasive heat that prickled like acid at their void, and Ghost saw that, in what little of the sky they could glimpse behind Herrah, the sun that had been distant and burning red was nothing of the sort now, all the obscuring clouds disappeared and the dream behind them clear at last.

It was golden. It was beautiful, radiant and brighter than the Dream Nail, brighter than anything, and Ghost recognized its heat. There was something wrong with its shape, it was too uneven, though anything beyond that was impossible to distinguish beyond the brilliant beam of its light.

If Herrah saw it she didn’t react, but the quick build of the Dream Nail’s power was slowed this time, hampered by something and fighting back, for it wasn’t a thing to be suppressed. It was a weapon of spilled over, uncontained light, and ever it sought to illuminate. What held it back was light as well, but this light festered and heated like hatred. It wasn’t light cool and bright like the Dream Nail was imbued by, and the artifact was far too fragile to contain it, too.

The handle cracked, and Infection like molten glass spilled from it over Ghost’s hand, searing it in a flash of growing, burning pain. In moments they couldn’t feel the hand at all, though they clenched it like a vise around the handle so that they couldn’t drop it, and still the Dream Nail wasn’t bright enough.

Herrah noticed, head jerking towards the little weapon, and snarled. “What have you done, you foolish little wyrmling? Do you mean to call my bluff?”

She laughed, short and harsh and just like Hornet. “I do not bluff.”

And in the next moments the Dream Nail’s hum finally crested higher than Ghost could hear, and as they brought it down as more a collapse of the strength of their arm, shrieking pain up to their shoulder, Herrah’s claws jerked and drove themselves into Ghost’s sides with fast, consecutive snaps of thin chitin, and Ghost had only the time to wonder if whatever became of them in dream would not follow them to awakening.

The Dream Nail shattered.

Ghost hoped that Hornet would be able to protect them from her mother.

There was no delay this time between waking and the Hollow Knight’s cry. And somehow it was much worse than ever before, something Ghost could never have considered even as they reeled from the pain of impalement.

For there was little of the Hollow Knight left, now. What called out was more Light than Void, more heat than cold, more rage than pain. Its mask was breaking, and this terrified and delighted it in equal measure. Its chest bubbled outward, black chitin warped with blazing heat and unending pressure, oozed a dribble of white-hot Infection to run down its side and its leg and melt that chitin, too. It hurt so very much, and the Hollow Knight could feel themself burning away by motes with so little left to lose, but the Radiance exulted.

And the mind the Radiance was still thinly caged within was more hers than theirs.

This call wasn’t of pain, and it wasn’t for help. The call was of triumph, hard-won and shining like merciless suns, shadowless and shrieking joy.

And threaded through it, an afterthought, was the death of the Sibling’s hope.

The Knight hadn’t come.

Ghost woke up screaming.

Panic rose high and choking in their throat, and they couldn’t think. There was only urgency, desperate and rending bleeding holes into their chest where their love for their family lived, shooting like sparks and charge into their claws and curling them like vices into the strangely giving surface they found themself digging into. They couldn’t care that they were whole again, unbroken from Herrah’s grip, because the Sibling _needed them_.

Ghost clawed and screamed and struggled, their only plan to go to the Hollow Knight, their sibling with so little time left, unsupported and dissipating by degrees like a shard of ice before the hot sun, falling at last to the burden they’d contained for so long, _dying_.

They were dying, and the knowledge felt like Ghost was, too.

But they couldn’t move, held in place by something that their claws couldn’t force away no matter how they wriggled and twisted. And then they weren’t held at all, only picked up from behind and held aloft. Ghost swiped blindly around, and then up at whatever was holding them so high, and only then did their senses begin to return from the haze of frenzied terror.

It was a narrow black hand, far larger than their own, and even though they froze when they recognized it as one it was already bleeding blueish hemolymph from deep cuts into the softer parts, around the fingers and the wrist. But it didn’t shake, and Ghost hung there, stiff and confused, following it back to a wide body and up to a masked, many-eyed face.

Herrah.

The thought returned the rest of their conscious awareness to them like the fear had been torn away, though their mask still pounded with headache and their void still ran quick and frightened. Ghost snatched back their still-flared claws, and noticed that they were running with that same hemolymph.

And now, fighting for a place alongside the panic, there was the seed of cold, mounting dread.

Ghost shook with the force of it and looked around and down.

The sight of Hornet’s pale, proud face looking up at them where they hung, carried high over the ground like a grub, was such an intense relief that Ghost shook all the harder, and tears finally overflowed from the eyes of their mask. They could face this, with her. Hornet knew what to do about everything.

And then Ghost saw her shawl, stained dark and torn to bloody shreds around her arms and shoulders, and that dread lunged for their heart and spread its own teeth like heavy, frigid water through their limbs. She was hurt, badly hurt, and there was blood on Ghost’s claws. The horror crashed over them and rose behind their eyes and they could only stare at what they’d done.

But she was talking, and now Ghost could hear what.

“Ghost, it’s alright. Wake up, it’s alright, there’s no one to hurt you,” Hornet was saying, her voice calm and level and gentle, with no trace of the pain she must be in. “You’re safe, little Ghost, I’m here.”

“I think it has regained itself.” Herrah rumbled above them, her voice just as calm but cutting as a nail.

She sounded as though she’d like to kill Ghost there and then for what they’d done. Ghost thought they wouldn’t stop her for the briefest moment before they shook the thought off. The guilt shattered sharp-edged and welled like blood in their chest and it cut so deeply they brought a hand up to see if it would come away wet.

They’d hurt their sister. Ghost sobbed, soundless save for the rustle of their cloak as their shoulders heaved, and Herrah dropped them unceremoniously.

Hornet gave a startled yelp and lunged forward to catch them when they didn’t move to catch themself, and hissed under her breath when they landed heavy in her arms. Ghost felt the wet of her embrace and had to forcibly stop themself from squirming out of it, their void roiling sick and violent but afraid more than anything of hurting her again.

But they didn’t react other than to lie limp where she held them and let themself weep, feeling tears black and chilled and pouring down their face faster and thicker than any natural crying. Their void rushed as though poured from on high and pounded within their shell and now with this, too, on top of everything, Ghost felt like they might come apart, physically if nothing else. They couldn’t allow it, not even in a single overwhelmed moment, not even when it was like everything at once had come down on top of them. They reached up with shaking bloodstained claws, only intending to wrap their arms around themself to keep their shaking void contained, but they didn’t make it that far. Hornet made an alarmed noise and shifted them to one arm, so as to use the other to grab Ghost’s wrists.

“Don’t do that. Please, little Ghost, tell me what’s wrong.” Hornet pleaded. “Here, let me,” She broke off, casting around for something.

“Mother, do you have something to write with and on?” Hornet asked, her voice steady and demanding.

“Silk weave and charcoal in the dresser. The ink will have long dried.” Herrah said darkly.

Hornet let Ghost’s hands go and compensated by crushing their front to hers as she strode across the bedchamber and into the adjoining room, and Ghost couldn’t do anything but let her.

Oh. And she’d spoken to Herrah. Ghost had interrupted Hornet’s reunion with her mother after hundreds of years and most of her life apart, and promptly clawed her half to death. The feeling of coming apart at the seams crested higher, until they found they could hardly move at all. It grew as they blankly looked around the room Hornet had carried them into while she opened and slammed shut drawer after drawer, muttering murderously to herself.

It was obviously Herrah’s. And yet, it was obviously not. It felt much closer, the ceiling low over a small, circular woven room, furnished mostly with a cluster of lumaflies set into the ceiling, the chest of drawers Hornet dug through, a wardrobe that wasn’t the size of Herrah’s plinth, let alone meant to contain her clothes, and a small bed covered with an ancient red blanket, faded lighter where it had been folded over the sides for centuries.

Hornet gave an impatient snarl as she found what she wanted, and set Ghost carefully down on the bed and then the silk and charcoal before them.

Ghost stared at them, and then at her.

“Tell me what’s wrong.” Hornet insisted like she wasn’t dripping blue onto the floor.

Ghost found the will to shake their head, and to point at her.

“There’s nothing wrong with- Ah, the wounds.” Hornet hesitated, then sat down besides them and called forth her own faintly glowing silk. “I will take care of it, and you will write. It doesn’t have to be exact, just your best approximation.” She said sternly and peeled off her shawl.

Ghost froze at the sight, the slowing tears renewed to run down their mask and stain the blanket below them.

Hornet noticed and sighed harshly. Ghost flinched from it, mind spiraling into conjured words Hornet hadn’t said, declarations of hate and abandonment that made their shoulders shake.

“It’s alright, it truly is.” Hornet said, her voice abruptly hushed and reassuring once more. “I’ve had much worse than this, you know I have, and you’ve hardly nicked me. My shell is tough, but your claws are small and sharp.” She tried for humor, and Ghost hiccupped in horror.

Hornet winced as they watched, already visibly regretting her words, and tried a different angle as she spun her silk into narrow, gleaming bandages that affixed themselves to the cracks in her shell. “It hardly hurts, Ghost. It will be entirely healed by tomorrow, and I know you didn’t mean to. You weren’t even awake. There’s no reason to be so upset over a few scratches, when most of the damage was caught by my shawl.”

Hornet laid the last silk bandage over the last shallow wound and it sealed to her chitin with a brief glow. She flexed her hand to ensure that it was properly applied, and then carefully opened her arms to offer them a hug, awkwardly unfolding like she couldn’t think of anything else to do with Ghost ignoring the writing materials.

Ghost jolted away, scrubbing at the trails of void their tears left cold over their mask with a shaking hand even as they ached for the comfort, even as they needed the solidity of their older sister’s protection to face what they’d done and what they had yet to do.

“Oh, little Ghost,” Hornet said quietly. “I do not blame you. I am not mad.”

She followed them, scooting over to their side of the bed where Ghost sat rigid and waiting for the other blow to fall.

But it never did. Instead, Hornet tentatively, gingerly enfolded them in a hug, waiting every moment for them to protest if they would. When they didn’t, Hornet pulled them close and squeezed them tight. Ghost felt sick at the brush of silk over their cloak, but her arms were warm and, though less encompassing without her shawl, certain and unhesitating once she had decided they wouldn’t squirm away.

She wasn’t furious, or accusing, or even sad. Her heartbeat was steady and her claws gentle as she laid them soothingly over the back of Ghost’s mask.

“I haven’t thanked you yet, either. So thank you, little Ghost, for my mother.” Hornet mumbled. “I dearly hope she isn’t the reason you’ve come away so fearful.”

Ghost shook their head unsteadily, still stiff, so Hornet continued to speak into the silence.

“We will learn sign,” Hornet promised. “As soon as this is over. I will search out that damned scholar and Emilitia both and make them teach us to the best of their abilities, and you can tell me what horrors you see when you return from the dream. What frightens you so, what hurts you so badly. And I will ensure you never have to face them again.”

Though what she proposed would come far too late to be of any use that Hornet might imagine, her words pacified Ghost’s circling thoughts. They promised that she’d not leave, and that she’d be by their side to help them when everything was over and there was no reason to be. They promised that there would _be_ an after-time to care about.

Ghost buried their face in her shoulder, hiding where they felt no scrape of silk. Hornet would help them, and they’d save the Hollow Knight before there was nothing left to save. Everything would turn out alright.

“Hornet?” Came a voice at the doorway.

Ghost felt Hornet tense and stay tensed, though her voice was raw when she answered.

“Yes, mother?”

“Would your sibling like to rest for a time, so that we might talk?” Herrah asked, her rough voice deliberately free of inflection.

Hornet sighed and asked Ghost the same. “If you wouldn’t be opposed, you could take this bed and rest. I won’t be long, and you need it.”

Ghost thought she was overlooking that she had just crossed all of the Infected denizens and all the thin, winding roads of Deepnest without rest, but she was right. They’d exhausted themself, more emotionally than physically, and they weren’t so oblivious as to not notice that she wanted to speak to her mother.

A tired twist of guilt curled in their void, and Ghost batted it away to nod into Hornet’s shoulder.

I’m sorry, they said at last, the words unclear even through void. They couldn’t think of anything else to say, nothing that would make it right, but they couldn’t just accept that she’d forgiven them without even an apology.

And she wouldn’t be able to hear it, anyway. Hornet set them down on the bed and Ghost crawled over to collapse facedown on the deflated, ancient pillow, sending up a cloud of dust. Ghost heard Hornet get up and retrieve her torn shawl, and then her and her mother’s quiet words as they left for the main bedchamber, presumably to do just as they’d promised.

Ghost found they couldn’t keep their wits about them a moment longer, their body heavy and exhausted by shock, and time blurred.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They're /so/ close, and everything is hurtling towards its conclusion, and the Powers That Be (me, I suppose) decide to dropkick Ghost twice in a row. Almost literally. Even I'm sort of wincing empathetically at this one, though it's the foreseeable zenith of everything that's led up to this point. Nothing happened that wasn't a minor escalation of a previous experience, and this is quite literally the lowest Ghost will ever get, topographically and emotionally.
> 
> Hornet's fine, overpowering guilt makes everything look worse. They've got tiny little claws, and they weren't trying to hurt her, only to get away to probably barrel headlong back into Deepnest and meet even more trouble. She'd have gotten worse falling into a patch of Queen's Gardens thorns. She'd have gotten worse fighting a mosscreep, probably. And now I have “what does hemolymph smell like” in my search history. The answer is an annoyed ladybug, apparently.
> 
> And the Dream Nail. Well, it was never meant to be used like that. Warranties are invalid if you don't use the product for its intended purpose. Remember when Monomon was talking, among other things, about the cleverness of hiding the Dreamers in the dream, intrinsically the Radiance's domain? It's only clever as long as the resident god doesn't notice.


	30. The Journey's Toll

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Herrah the Beast, the Dreamer, the queen, the mother.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Parent-child discussion, arachnophobia? Sorry Old Stag.

The next thing they noticed, perhaps less than an hour later, was Hornet sighing heavily from the doorway. Her steps were loud and slow as she crossed the room and, when Ghost looked up and hurriedly rolled out of the way, she threw herself onto the bed with a grunt. Hornet stretched out on her stomach, horns angled almost flat against her back, and closed her eyes.

Ghost tentatively reached over and patted at her mask, which Hornet cracked open an eye for.

“’M fine, just tired,” She said, muffled by the pillow. “Rest more if you want, or go get something to eat. D’nt worry about me, mother had something brought. I’ll likely be here when you get back.”

Ghost nodded as she shut her eyes again, burrowed her face into the pillow, and almost immediately began to snore. They didn’t blame her; several days without rest was pushing it for anyone. Ghost only regretfully wished, as they watched her for a moment while she snuffled into the old fabric, clearly exhausted, that they’d gotten her to take a moment before throwing herself at Deepnest.

And at the same time even this moment of respite, something they would never begrudge their sister, especially after what they’d done, grated at them and scraped at their frayed nerves. The Hollow Knight wouldn’t leave their mind.

It wasn’t like before, when they’d had the wisdom to treat the journey like a marathon, one that required breaks and a somewhat winding path to complete with all the knowledge that there was little to differentiate the now from any of the hundreds of years past. With the breaking of the last seal they were on a very real time limit, and Ghost was very, very aware of it.

So Ghost left her to it, not particularly trusting themself not to fidget enough to wake her and feeling, if not particularly rested, then at least better than before and filled with renewed determination. Hornet needed her rest and they wouldn’t let anyone, least of all themself, interfere with it. They clambered past her and padded out of what must have been, at one point, Hornet’s bedroom. They supposed now it might be such again.

Ghost found Herrah in the main bedchamber, sitting on her stone plinth and staring fixedly down at the floor. She looked up as they entered, and Ghost suddenly thought they’d like to be anywhere else as her empty, somehow still steely gaze fixed on them. But she didn’t say anything, and Ghost wondered if they’d be so lucky as to leave without her judgement. They wondered if they wanted to.

And then Herrah chuckled, low and grating. “I suppose I should be thanking you, Ghost of Hallownest. You freed me from my binds as a Dreamer, and you brought me my daughter once more. By all means, I owe you at least a handful of debts.”

She shifted on the plinth, straightening her stance to look down upon them from even higher than before. “I thank you, then. All I’ve done, I’ve done for Hornet and for Deepnest. And now that Deepnest is fallen alongside Hallownest, she is all that remains to me of the things that I love. Do you know why I accepted the Wyrm’s request, to fulfill the role of Dreamer for him?” Deepnest’s vicious queen asked conversationally.

Herrah waited for them to respond, frighteningly still for her bulk, until Ghost shook their head.

“It’s because I thought doing so would give Deepnest a future. My people would have my daughter, my own blood and half-higher being, immune to the Infection and a fierce protector, to guide them. They would be protected from Hallownest, for half of my value as Dreamer came from the loyalty and endless guard of my subjects. And, all going according to plan, the Infection the damned Wyrm stirred up wouldn’t come for them alongside his people. All it would take would be the loss of my life and any time I might have had to raise my daughter.”

“A worthy sacrifice. One I was not afraid to make. One I did not expect to wake from.”

Herrah gave a heavy sigh and finally turned her face away. “Yet now I have seen for myself that Deepnest is dead. Those that walk its webs still are only shells, and their eyes burn with an angered god. Yet they remember me. My devout are still loyal, though language is lost to their tongues and their claws seek flesh. There is hope. Perhaps, should the Infection be destroyed at its source…”

The Queen cut herself off, and began again with intensity. “I will not forget that you harmed my child as I watched. It is not in my nature to take such a slight without retribution. But slay the god of dreams that plagues what remains of my people and I will forgive. I imagine Hornet herself never considered it a slight in the first place. What have you done, Ghost of Hallownest, to earn a spider’s loyalty? It is not such an easy thing to gain.” Herrah pondered aloud.

She looked again to them, turning her still mask to face them head-on. “You are the King of Hallownest, she tells me, by right of birth and conquest. It would save me significant trouble to eat you now, cut the head off from my enemy while its neck lies open to my claws.”

Ghost refused to falter, staring her down and conscious of their nail at their back.

Herrah chuckled again. “I won’t, worry not, cold little thing. There must be something more than a cruel sovereign and a haunted soul to you, for Hornet to expressly forbid me from trying. She seemed to be under the impression that I might not even succeed, if I were to take my claws and fangs to you. What do you make of that, Ghost?”

Ghost shrugged.

“Hm, fair enough. I suppose there is only so much information I can press you for, given the circumstances.”

Herrah suddenly clapped two of her hands together, the sound not quite enough to startle Ghost but certainly to catch their attention, if Herrah hadn’t had it already. “Now that the unpleasantries are out of the way, would you like to hear of Hornet’s spiderling days? She was a darling little thing, and I’ve always wanted to embarrass her by telling someone of her adventures. Oh, she was the most ridiculous creature, not half your size and mostly head and eyes. Yet she got into the most creative sorts of trouble.”

Herrah gazed down at them and Ghost thought that behind the empty holes of her mask they could see the glint of her eyes. “I have been asleep for an extremely long time, and I long for something pleasant to do. I dreamed of little but her, so all I remember is as fresh to my mind as though it happened hours ago. Come, sit down and listen, that’s what you were made to do, isn’t it?”

And so Ghost found themself sat beside Herrah as she animatedly told them of all the childish mischief Hornet got into during the brief time Herrah had been allowed to keep her, and found Herrah an excellent story-teller, her gravelly voice softened with affection even as she recalled the time her daughter had ruined an entire storage room’s worth of fine silk by using it as an especially reactive battleground to messily slay a dirtcarver with her first needle.

Or just before her second molt, when she’d been out of sight for not a full minute and intentionally dunked herself in a bright blue dye bath, turning her white mask a solid turquoise and making herself colorblind right up until she’d molted a new one.

Or when Hornet had been just days old and, instead of learning to walk and keep her balance, only barreled with her head lowered bullishly at anywhere she wanted to go, which more often than not ended with the tiny spider headbutting walls at full force and knocking herself flat, terrifying anyone nearby.

Or the brief period where she’d insisted on joining her mother at every meeting she attended, namely to shout demands at whatever poor souls were trying to discuss political matters with Herrah, and often ending discussions early by climbing on tables and calling for their blood like the world’s smallest, crossest bodyguard.

And so on for several hours as Herrah gleefully recounted what had to have been most of Hornet’s early childhood while Ghost listened, more and more fascinated and half-reluctantly amused with every tale she shared until they were convinced that not only was Hornet’s reactive, confrontational nature something she’d had from her earliest days, but that Herrah was an extremely patient and good-natured person when it came to those she loved.

And there was little Herrah loved more than Hornet.

She was giggling uncontrollably as she narrated exactly how Hornet had worded her first demand for a weapon, for the specific purpose of “citing her foes,” when Hornet herself emerged from the bedroom, rubbing tiredly at an eye and looking more sleepy than anything else.

“Hornet, my dear, I’ve just finished telling your sibling how you asked for a needle when you were younger!” Herrah greeted her.

Hornet stopped in her tracks and gave her mother the most doleful look Ghost had ever seen on her face.

“Is that what you’ve been doing this whole time? Telling them grub stories? Surely I hadn’t done nearly enough by then to fill several hours’ conversation.” Hornet suggested with the faint hope of one who didn’t actually believe what they were imploring.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself, you were a wonderful child. The smallest, most bloodthirsty spiderling I’d ever met.” Her mother told her with pride.

“Ah, you remember that.” Hornet darted a glance at Ghost. “And you told them…?”

“Oh, only my favorites. Such is a mother’s duty, dear. I’m making up for lost time. Who else am I to relay your exploits to?” Herrah chittered.

“My exploits…?”

“Many and eventful.” Herrah told her fondly. “Likely caused more damage to Deepnest than all the dirtcarvers could in a year. I remember it like it was yesterday.”

Hornet scowled, then seemed to recall who she was scowling at and morphed the expression into uncomfortable half-pleading. “Mother, that was a terrible joke.”

“Oh, Hornet. You haven’t heard my best ones. I’ve been Queen a long time, and one picks up their fair share of terrible jokes.”

Ghost could hardly connect this new, playfully loving mother to Herrah the Beast of a few hours ago who, by her own profession, might have eaten them before they could make too much trouble for her if not for Hornet apparently foreseeing that specific possibility and asking that she refrain. It was more difficulty than it was worth, and Ghost of all bugs knew that one might have different faces to express for different people, so they’d decided after the first hour or so to simply accept this friendlier Beast and hope for the best.

The best, as it turned out, was a new appreciation for how much Hornet had grown as a person over the centuries, and the growing understanding that as quick to turn to her needle as she was now, it wasn’t a patch on when she was young. It was a wonder she hadn’t unintentionally murdered them when they were small, too.

“I look forward to learning of all that you have done in the meantime, my gift.” Herrah told her daughter, her voice impossibly affectionate. “You’ve grown so much. It’s hard to believe that the tiny pale thing that I had so little time to cherish has become the powerful, sure, good bug I see before me.”

Hornet’s eyes went wide and dark, and she looked at once like the little spiderling Ghost had met all that time ago. Then something snapped into place and they narrowed, and Hornet nodded decisively.

“I will fulfill my duty and carry the burden given to me. We are so close, mother, we have only-“

“My dear, there is much to being a ruler,” Herrah broke in gently. “And only a small part is being the one to stand strong when your people require it. Who has helped you, all these long years?”

“I- No one. None since the last of the Great Knights.” Hornet replied, faintly tinged with shame.

Herrah stared as though she couldn’t believe what her daughter told her. “No one? Not a soul? Where has the Pale King and his guard been? You told me that my sleep has lasted-“

“Many, many years. Too many to count.” Hornet said quietly. “The Pale King has been gone since only years after you went to dream.”

“And you have…? This entire time…?” Herrah breathed.

“I have done what I could.” Hornet said stiffly.

“Hornet, my little one, I’m not worried for what you could or could not have done.” Herrah said lowly. “I am worried for you. Am I wrong to say that you have carried the burden of Hallownest alongside Deepnest, all this time?”

“…No.” Hornet replied, so quiet it might have been a whisper from far off.

“A Kingdom dying around you, and you bore it all. My gift, I’m so sorry.” Herrah said, her stern voice soft. She stood from the plinth and walked to stand before her daughter, who stared up at her like she’d drawn the floor out from beneath her feet.

“For what? Mother, I couldn’t just-“

“I know. That is why I regret so. I left you that burden, the responsibility to Deepnest, and your other parent handed you his own. Raised as you were, there was no way you might have not felt beholden to the welfare of all Hallownest and beyond. Brought up a Princess and Protector, there is nothing else you might have done but take on more than you could carry.”

Hornet bristled. “I carried it because there were no others to. It’s not a matter of upbringing; it was a matter of duty.”

“And what has it given you? Not pride, not joy, not happiness or a land and people you might rely upon. The burden of the dying never should have been yours. But Hornet, I am so proud of you.”

“Why? Why could you possibly be proud?” Hornet broke from playing at calm to cry out. “I _failed_. Deepnest _died_ under my care, and then Hallownest followed it to the grave. There is nothing left, and not a moment of that loss was under any watch but mine. I have the deaths of hundreds of thousands on my hands, and I did not even die of the Infection myself. I watched it all crumble around me and there was _nothing_ I could do.”

“You’re right,” Herrah said simply, reaching down and pulling her daughter into a many-armed embrace. Hornet resisted for a moment, giving a frustrated, shaky exhale, and then butted her head into her mother’s carapace. Herrah cradled her close and crooned to her.

“There was nothing you could have done.” Herrah said. “You could not turn a needle against a plague. The Wyrm himself failed to stop it. Why I am proud has little to do with what you did or did not do, but what you became. You might easily have become cold and vicious, but instead you care so deeply. You might have rightfully turned hatred towards your kingdom and a careless eye over your people, and those people not even yours, but even now you fight for them with all the fire in your soul.”

Herrah gave her a squeeze and leaned down to nuzzle once at her daughter’s curving horns, so like her own. “And I will be here to help you with the rest. There is always hope, my dearest spiderling, always a battle to be won. And we will snatch a life from the jaws of defeat.”

Hornet shuddered and let herself be held another moment, nuzzling in turn into Herrah’s abdomen, and then backed away and looked defiantly up at her.

“Then that battle we must face. And then the future awaits.” Hornet said. “Only this one last battle.”

“Yes, I imagine so. I was the last seal remaining to the Hollow Knight, was I not?” Herrah asked, brushing a hand over the crest of Hornet’s horns and cleaning away invisible debris.

“You were. They die unguarded.”

“And you take your half-sibling to that fated fight. I assume there is a plan other than the one the Pale King enacted?”

Hornet hesitated then, and looked to Ghost.

Ghost nodded, trying to seem more sure than they felt.

“I believe so. And at any rate, there is no second chance, and no time to look for another. The seals have been removed, and the Hollow Knight’s strength fails under their burden. We must act now, or never again.” Hornet said, as grim as a general to her troops.

Herrah scooped her off the ground into a fierce hug, to which Hornet gave a startled squawk, and set her down again just as fast, leaning down so a pair of her hands could straighten her repaired shawl while another cradled her mask.

“Fight hard, my little one, and make your enemies fear. Come home safe to me. I would go with you to this event, but there is much I must do here still. This is not a battle to be won by my force. And, essentially, I’ve been informed that my paperwork is centuries late.” Herrah laughed.

Hornet rolled her eyes. “Mother-“

“Go on then, my dear,” Herrah encouraged. “Do what you must, and then come home. I’ll likely be needing your help to revive a kingdom. And you, little Ghost,” Herrah called to them.

Ghost looked up at her questioningly.

“Try to come back in one piece as well. We will need to iron out negotiations going forwards between our peoples, or whatever might remain of them, and that will be difficult with half the negotiation party dead or otherwise indisposed. Think on your terms as you fight.” Herrah warned, friendly enough for Ghost to nod without too much intimidation.

They sincerely hoped there wouldn’t be much fighting, anyway.

Hornet was already leaving, her stride long and sure, and all Ghost saw was a flicker of her red shawl as she passed out of the bedchamber, leaving Ghost to run after her before she could get too far ahead.

The way back out of Herrah’s winding, silk-spun fortress was just as easy as coming in, easier even, as the main hall remained empty of villagers as they passed through. Hornet was already thinking out loud, and more than her quick planning, the alert, ready glint in her eyes and the focused efficiency of her stride reassured Ghost. They nearly didn’t need to know what she intended to do; that she knew so clearly what it was and felt well enough to throw herself wholeheartedly into the bringing about of it was enough.

Ghost trusted her with everything.

“The stag station,” Hornet said. “There exists only one in all of Deepnest, but as far as I know it was never used. Or at least, it was never used during my lifetime. It had gone to dust and neglect long before I hatched, and always stood silent and empty, mostly discussed to be an uncomfortably-tolerated reminder of the Pale King’s intentions, but should it have a bell… Do you think your stag will be able to find it?”

Ghost nodded quickly, scrambling over an upturned table and following at Hornet’s heels as she stepped outside the great cocoon and squinted around into the dim.

It wasn’t the sort of darkness Ghost did well to see in, to their equal irritation and novelty, but Hornet had little trouble. This dark was, after all, only an absence of light instead of the presence of void, and Ghost thought that if one grew up in Deepnest, one must be good at brushing it aside.

“There.” Hornet said, and pointed at what Ghost recalled as the direction they’d come from, except her hand was angled much higher than the tunnels they’d left.

Then she was moving again, and Ghost followed behind as she leapt up suspended fragments of solid floor, dangled over the endless unforgiving drop below, so characteristic of Deepnest. They’d been closer than Ghost had thought to the cavern wall, slick and cold with running moisture and sticky with weblike pale lines, seams in the stone affixed to its surface and left, durable, ever since.

And then from the gloom loomed a deeper dark as the walls approached, scooped into the stone like a shadow more reluctant to depart than the rest. The station.

It was heavily webbed, nearly as heavily as the Beast’s Den itself, the silk draped directly over and around and across the smooth walkway as though strung up to obstruct from its purpose, or to deny entry from the other side. There was a bench there, Ghost saw, but it was not only thick with silk but split neatly in two.

The message couldn’t have been clearer; Deepnest did not want the stag station. It did not want what it achieved, and it certainly didn’t appreciate what it stood for.

And yet the bell still stood, unbroken and free of spiders’ silk. The station had been built to completion, and the tunnels spun away as far as Ghost could see. It had been welcomed, once, or at least used.

They wondered what had changed.

Hornet wasted no time on such thoughts, swatting at the bell with a strike of her claws. Ghost reluctantly approved; her needle might have been too long to hit it correctly. Regardless of how it was struck, the bell’s ringing filtered out clear and clean as the day it was forged.

And, as ever, the Stag answered.

He did not gallop to greet them as usually he did, trotting into the station and swinging his grand, horned head side to side so as to examine it with trepidation from both large black eyes. Hornet made an impatient noise and he snapped to attention, pulling meekly up alongside the platform.

“Little one, little Ghost,” The Stag said, his gruff voice hushed and frightened. “I do not know this place. Never have I been to this station, yet I fear it so. Why have you brought me here? Quickly, come, let us leave before we are found.”

Found by what, or whom, Ghost could guess. Hornet was less sympathetic.

“If you fear the spiders, then you will be consumed by them. But not today.” She told him. “Take us to Dirtmouth.”

The Stag went stiff-limbed and his harsh breath grew harsher at her words, but he stood fast through his shaking and allowed them to board before throwing himself, nearly tripping with desperation to flee the dark, into the stagways.

The ride was more upset and uneven than ever before for much of the trip, the Stag’s gait only settling when they neared the surface and the light began to return, but it was also faster than any other. Ghost jumped down once they pulled into the station and pulled the Stag’s proud horn into a tight hug nearly before he’d stopped.

The Stag’s breath was still fast, and there were jitters shaking through his spindly legs and up into his broad carapace, so Ghost stroked at his armored head to console him.

“Ghost,” Hornet warned, already nearly out the door.

“Little Ghost, I thank you for your kindness,” the old Stag said through a shuddering breath, folding his creaking legs beneath him. “I know not what dangers lurk, only that I will not see the stagways as my own domain any longer. Not knowing how intimately connected they are to… To the depths and the many. I believe I will stay here a time, and regain my courage. Yet, I will always answer the bell.” The Stag said, and this time, it sounded less like an oath and more like a terror.

“What things might ring it, what fangs might greet me?” He murmured. “May I never know.”

“Nothing.” Hornet broke in, and Ghost could hear the scowl in her voice. “The beings you speak of are my own people, who you need not fear so. Not because they aren’t dangerous, but because they aren’t foolish. There is no reason to reach so far into Hallownest to drag back a single stag. Fear the things that you cannot run from, not the spiders.”

And with that she was gone, finished waiting for them. Ghost gave the Stag, his heavy head laying listlessly on the stone, a final apologetic pat.

Just as they stood to leave, the Stag spoke up once more. “Little one, wait. As we fled that awful place, there was something sparked within my mind. An urge, alien to me, to run ways that I was not called to take. I believe it to lead to my home, my nest. So I cannot stay. Little traveler, I must return to it, yet I will not go where I am not required. Will you grant me leave to travel there in your stead, though you leave now where the stagways don’t reach? My friend, will you allow me this?” The Stag asked, his tired voice shaken.

Ghost nodded, and then nodded again, urgently. They might never understand the Stag’s loyalty to the empty stagways, but if their acquiescence might help their friend, they would grant it in a heartbeat, even if it meant they could never travel with him again, though they doubted that was what he meant.

And really, after this, there could hardly be anything more urgent than this last journey. They might never need the Stag again, not like they had. The thought shot fire and resolve into Ghost’s void and they turned and ran after Hornet all at once, even as the Stag jolted unsteadily to his own feet.

“Thank you!” The Stag called after them, and then Ghost was gone.

Elderbug called to them, and one of Myla’s siblings shouted a greeting as they darted past, but in the end it was Lurien they couldn’t escape without an explanation when they caught up with Hornet.

“You left without saying goodbye. Ah, well, Ghost did.” Lurien said, slightly dejected. For whatever reason he was sat with his back to the dry Dirtmouth well, a knife in hand and a small, partially-carved block of shellwood in the other.

Hornet stared severely down at him. “Farewell, then. Perhaps it will not be the last time we speak.”

“I- What? Hornet, what are you talking about?” Alarm crept into Lurien’s voice, and the tall bug set down his carving.

“We go to destroy the Infection, or perhaps to ensure Hallownest’s demise.” Hornet said calmly. “And we are on limited time, so move aside.”

“But Hornet-“ Lurien protested.

Hornet drew her needle, and he cut himself off.

“You won’t hurt me.” Lurien said, though his voice was high and shaky.

“Not if you move.” Hornet replied.

Ghost had had enough. They pushed Hornet’s needle aside with an impatient hand, to her short sound of displeasure, and gave Lurien a breathless hug. Sitting down, he was only perhaps twice Ghost’s height, and he was thin enough that they could get their arms most of the way around him if they squeezed. He was stiff as a board, and they could hear his quickened breath, unnerved behind his mask.

Hornet was right. It might not work, none of it. But Ghost thought it would, and they squeezed tighter as Lurien made a bewildered noise to tell him so.

No, Ghost didn’t think they would die anymore. They were far too stubborn, and loved far too many people to leave them behind. And, they thought with some small amount of gallows humor, they were hardly a bug, so it might just stick.

Lurien unfroze slowly to wrap an uneasy arm around them, too, and pat at the top of their mask, and then Ghost let go and backed up some. Lurien stared back, bewildered, and Ghost gave him a little wave. He waved back, just a brief twitch of the hand he already had frozen aloft where he hadn’t known where else to put it.

Ghost padded to the well and scaled its crumbling walls without hesitation. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hornet's long-awaited happy beginning! Not quite an ending, because she hasn't yet met with her ultimate goal, but damn if having her mother back and the looming responsibility of caring for two destroyed kingdoms taken off her shoulders in one fell swoop isn't a happy little coincidence. Herrah has this ruling thing on lock, and if Hornet will listen to anyone telling her to take it easy, it's her mom. 
> 
> And she really needed someone to tell her she'd done the best she could, and that that's all anyone could have done. Hornet needed a hug.
> 
> And we have Ghost, who has never intentionally worked through an emotion they could put off until it becomes an Issue in their life and isn't starting today.


	31. One Last Battle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Hollow Knight is changed.
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Body horror

The heated, rushing air blew past them as they fell, and for that split instant Ghost marveled at how much more they knew, now.

And to think, not so long ago they’d thought they couldn’t even love any longer. Had they known, even then, that that was the reason they’d come back? Love, and the capacity for love, that even the wastes couldn’t bury beneath the silt and scraping sand, not entirely, not beyond hope of revival? Could they have known that they stood to lose so much, and gain something better? 

A family. No, they wouldn’t have believed it even if they’d known.

Ghost landed lightly on their feet on the ancient stone below, and the Crossroads was just as they remembered it under all the boiling, pustulent orange. And just as before, Ghost noticed the Radiance’s call.

It was so much stronger now, pulsing in waves and insistent, enough that Ghost could actually, truly feel how it whispered and stoked their anger and their desperation to fever-pitch, if only it were allowed to do so. But Ghost was not a bug, only a child of the Void and the Wyrm, two things that left no room for another god to scrabble a foothold. There was little she could do to them unless they allowed it.

Perhaps she would have her chance, then.

Hornet dropped down behind them, and they heard her stagger as the same force hit her much harder than it had hit Ghost. Hornet was, after all, half bug, however much a force of nature Herrah was.

But she was also Hornet, and her eyes were dark as the Abyss and clear of color when she looked down at them, and the only anger they could see was exactly that which she always carried, sometimes hidden by stoicism and careful, intentional calm, sometimes brought to arms and used as a weapon alongside her needle. Now it was cast around her like a shield, all unrelenting determination and ready challenge.

And here she was, alongside them as they prepared to open the Black Egg at last. Ghost loved their sister so much that it hurt their chest.

Hornet had no such hesitation. “Hurry,” She urged them like they didn’t know better than she did what they went to meet, as though they hadn’t stopped only to ensure that she would still be herself.

Ghost nodded anyway, and this time they were the one to lead the way, leaping surefooted over shattered arches and away from husks hissing like trapped steam, without so much as drawing their nail and without looking back. There was no need; even if they couldn’t hear the singing of Hornet’s needle, darting through the air like a gleam of light, they’d know she was close behind.

They turned a final corner, one they’d passed more often than perhaps anything else in Hallownest, and they were before the Black Egg Temple.

It was a horror.

Even if they hadn’t known what lay trapped within, the Black Egg Temple would have seemed a diseased, haunted place. Burning light like smokeless flame shone through the broad windows, wavering with trapped heat, and flanking it were the immense swellings of fluid Infection that grew, bulging and larger than some of the houses in Dirtmouth above, swollen from where the temple met the crumbling stone. The blinding light within spilled out from the doorway like warning, or bold invitation, that when Ghost stepped into it seeped against their mind, pressing still for weakness it wouldn’t find.

And within they saw that past the loosely sealed door, the very same they’d though unpassable days that felt like lifetimes ago, came coils and streams of virulent Infection, of the Radiance’s power, curling of their own volition more than due to underground drafts through the air, thick and hazy and pricking at Ghost’s mind when they passed through them. Vines, pulsing orange and twitching like hurt things grew up around the outside of the egg, curling close to but never touching its entrance, all the seals seen and defeated and dim.

Ghost touched a hand at last to the Black Egg’s door.

Under their claws it flashed blinding pale, only once and very briefly, and crumbled like Ghost had drawn away the last of the solidity of the stone. And the Black Egg was opened, its seals all cast aside.

The Hollow Knight called out, but this time, it was only a call. The first Ghost had heard, truly heard, in such a very long time. It wasn’t the desperate expansion of an agonized mind, or the plea for help of a kindred soul. It was only the Sibling’s voice, hurting and quiet in Ghost’s void, reactive only to this weakening of their bonds.

Nothing could have kept Ghost from going to them.

“Ghost, wait,” Hornet said as they made to enter the unsealed hall.

They didn’t stop.

“Ghost, I cannot follow you!” Hornet called to them, her voice harsh and high with something they’d never heard from her.

Ghost paused, looked over their shoulder back to her, standing pale and crimson and untouched amongst the full force of the Infection, and further back than they'd thought she'd been.

“Even from here I feel that terrible force pull at my life, the Void that you are of. It is cold, like you, but unlike you it is implacable and fading with the creature it sustains. This fight is yours, but if there comes a chance,” Hornet paused, but it didn’t feel like hesitation.

“If there comes a chance to aid you, I will not allow you to die.” She finished, and it sounded like a trade. Like there would come a cost for such a deed, one she had at last decided to accept. “Sibling, you possess strength unlike the emptiness I had seen within you. There is an end here, but it does not have to be yours.”

Ghost gazed back at her, their sister who now they could see feared so much and never for herself. They would come back. Ghost would always come back.

They nodded to her and walked into the open door at last.

The inside of the egg was dark, yes, but it was only the darkness of void. They walked a narrow path, held in place only by the slender pale seals gleaming against the black, holding it at bay. It was just like Hornet had said. It felt like the Abyss, yet now it asked nothing of Ghost. Only waited passively by, complacent alongside itself, the seals around the path untested.

Up ahead, at the very end of the impossibly long, straight path directly into the heart of the Black Egg, was a pale engraving, and behind it, an open door. The words whispered as Ghost passed, though they didn’t stop to hear them all.

“…will be whole again,” It breathed, and the voice it spoke with held regret as Ghost had never heard it to. It sounded tired, haggard and thin as wind through dry autumn leaves. Ghost thought they knew why, and could not forgive.

The doorway behind it was anything but pale, and far from void. Strung even so far from within with chains ancient and tranquil as though they were shadows themselves, the air roiling with Infection that spread and filtered through it like drops of oil over water, solid enough to disperse as they passed through Ghost’s hands but washing like foreign rage over their mind instead of their body. Beyond it burned a hateful orange, drawing them in, furious and straining to lash out and taunting them to come within reach of its caged, invidious claws.

Their steps were silent on the void-soaked floor as they walked through it and beheld the Hollow Knight.

They were not as they once were.

Ghost hadn’t expected them to be, yet still felt something painful twist inside them to see the Hollow Knight suspended in the epicenter of all the rot and the sweet, rolling stench of the Radiance’s Infection. The iron chains and pale god-seals holding them in place were worn and vulnerable where they were jointed to the floor, but entirely intact, and they were the only things to be.

The Hollow Knight raised their proud, broken head and leveled Ghost with their gaze, still and calm like heated glass warmed hot enough to blister, should one be foolish enough to disturb it.

Ghost had seen the same stare a hundred thousand times before. The Hollow Knight was grown and eaten away to nearly nothing and _hurting_ and _furious_ , but they were still the Sibling. Ghost recognized their eyes, the weak, writhing draw of their void, smothered beneath so much anger, even if not their horns.

Even if there was little to recognize. They were so quiet.

Their cloak was stained a sickly rotted color almost certainly nothing like it had been when they’d put it on, and its trailing edges, decay-dark and tattered, dripped a slow, steady orange drip down to the floor they hung above. Chains were wrapped around their body and hooked into the armor they wore, that once might have been silver.

Beneath them, driven into the stone below, was an immense, deeply cracked nail, just as old and corroded as Ghost’s had been when they’d picked it up from the wastes’ sand. It towered above them, and the Hollow Knight towered even above that like a caught wraith, dark and dirtied with radiant, golden eyes not their own.

The chains were driven by iron and seal into the floor, weakened by time and light. They could be broken; Ghost could tell by only looking at them. Ghost drew their nail and struck at the first.

The Hollow Knight’s terrible eyes fell focused on them, their banked orange glow brightening as Ghost methodically destroyed their bindings. Not once did they cry out, and never did they say a word. They only hung there, deceptively calm, while Ghost cut them down seal by seal. Ghost nearly hoped they’d be able to do what they thought they might without resistance by the time they’d severed the last seal, breaking with a snap and the skittering hiss of disintegrating power, each chain shining and then gone.

And with the release of the final binding, the Hollow Knight dropped to the ground and fell into a crouch, and Ghost found themself unable to move, entirely focused on them, hoping against all logic.

The Hollow Knight stood up, and it was obvious they hadn’t moved in an age, but not because they were slow or stiff, like Hornet when she’d just woken up. The Hollow Knight jerked upright all at once like they were a puppet on a string, staggering forward and letting their head hang low like it wasn’t worth the trouble to animate with the rest of them.

But their head, their arching, pale mask struck through with deeper cracks than Ghost had ever seen on a living Vessel, turned to face Ghost, and the Hollow Knight’s body followed. They took up their longnail in their left hand without shifting their gaze, molten and blind. And then they screamed.

There was nothing but the sound, no void-voice to make it resonate and only the empty rage of the Radiance, mindless and entirely, vengefully focused on them, so though it hurt and clawed at Ghost’s chest and crawled into their throat, they gripped their own nail and shifted on their feet.

The Hollow Knight lunged, and they fought viciously and without mercy, for mercy required a mind to conceive of it and a soul to desire it. They were so much larger than Ghost, grown and unfeeling and armed with a nail they clearly knew how to use, one more than a few times the length of Ghost’s whole body. They loomed where they had shielded, frenetic and disjointed where they had been, once, ever as unswerving as the night.

Yet they weren’t a threat. That struck Ghost more than anything else; the Hollow Knight was not able to hurt them. Not because they lessened their blows or hesitated; they simply weren’t fast enough, staggering on already half-broken legs and leaking orange over the stone below. Ghost had been nearly worried to fight them, that the Sibling they remembered as so much surer and stronger than they would have grown even more so in the intervening years. But the Hollow Knight couldn’t touch them with their wide, sweeping blows, each born of trial, of skill and practice, and each as brutally undercut by simple physical weakness, something even the greatest warrior couldn’t overcome.

The Hollow Knight was crumbling. Vessel for the Radiance, yes, but so worn through that it left little to use.

Ghost hurt them, though. Every little cut they made to the Hollow Knight’s legs, to force them to fall so that Ghost could take away their nail and try to take away their pain, made them fear that it would be the wound to shatter them, the Hollow Knight already cracking their own frail chitin with the force with which they struck out with their nail, driving sparks up when it skated gratingly over stone instead of cutting into Ghost.

It was perhaps the single worst thing Ghost had ever knowingly done, picking away at them like that, intentionally letting the Hollow Knight drive themself to exhaustion and ruin and, hopefully, to their knees before either of those, yet Ghost couldn’t so much as spare the concentration to feel the retribution their own mind would wage on them, the scores their resentful heart would make in their soul. Only the calm focus of the battle, something that had always allowed them to narrow their attention to the exclusion of all else.

And then the Hollow Knight did something unexpected, that shook away that calm as easily as one might draw a tarp off from a piece of furniture.

They made as though to attack again, looked directly into Ghost’s eyes, and gave a single, violent shiver.

The Hollow Knight’s gaping eyes, huge and burning so bright the pale of their mask was dull and grey around them, were shaded all at once by a thin veneer of void, fragile as moths’ wings and just as quickly burned through when held to the Radiance’s flame. They stared at Ghost, and that flicker of void braced itself and turned back into the consuming inferno.

And they jerked to a stop, as though seized about the chest and forced still, flipped their nail around in their grip without hesitation and with more skill than they’d wielded it, and plunged the broken tip into their chest with a sinking, breaking sound too liquid to be from chitin, nearly lost beneath the sputtering hiss of running Infection like the rush of water escaping high pressure.

Once, twice, again, _again_.

The Infection sprayed and spattered like sparks from an uncontrolled burn and dripped heavily, viscous, down their weapon to sear the Hollow Knight’s hand, its outline wavering in the heat but unyielding and still pushing the nail deeper.

It was perhaps the only thing they could have done to shatter Ghost from their focus, and shatter it did. If the Hollow Knight hadn’t collapsed to the ground then, jerkily pulling the nail free with a horrible, wet noise and a congealed gush of Infection, shuddering and crying and bleeding out, a thin shadow, narrow amidst the pool of orange spreading and still falling around them that left even the Radiance shocked and reeling, Ghost didn’t know if they could have avoided the next deadly, uncoordinated strike of their nail when it came.

And then they heard Hornet’s battle cry, like a jubilant thrust of a knife, saw the flash of her bright red shawl and the pale of her silk whipping like the gleams from a blade through the air, and her needle was driven with a crack that Ghost heard above it all into the Hollow Knight’s mask, and her thread drawn tight around them.

The Hollow Knight immediately began to struggle, but her silk was spun steel from her own pale power and Hornet held her ground, driving the end of her needle that much deeper for their effort.

This was their chance, if only Ghost could take it.

They could. And they did.

Hornet’s hands loosened on her needle as Ghost unfroze and darted close, and Hornet, where only a moment before she had attacked with ferocity that might well have killed the Hollow Knight where they knelt, now sagged unconscious against their broad mask and fell to the side. Her silk flickered dangerously and the Hollow Knight thrashed their head, knocking free the needle with a parting splinter of white. The crack in their mask seeped liquid Infection that dripped down their face, was flung in droplets by the force of their maddened writhing.

This had to end now, or Ghost would lose them both.

Ghost was stood before the Hollow Knight’s mask, staring into the wide, burning eyes that met their own without any black, only the intensity and fathomless rage of a captured, forgotten sun. They could feel the sweltering heat, unbearable, that fell from the corona of the discarded god within.

Then the Hollow Knight fell still, unnaturally so and all at once. It wasn’t the stillness of recognition, not from the Hollow Knight. The Radiance stared out at Ghost, and she _hated_ them, and she was scared.

Ghost placed a shaking hand on the Hollow Knight’s mask, gently ran their thumb across one of the bleeding tracks of Infection as though to brush away a tear, burning hot as molten glass and blazing like streaks of sunlight into Ghost’s eyes, but though it began to eat at the chitin of their hand and swarm outward, gold and demanding, over their vision, Ghost couldn’t let themself look away. They spoke to the Hollow Knight then as they had not spoken to another for the creeping growth of stone and the rasping erosion of wind.

I am the Knight. My name is Ghost. I won’t leave you here.

They said calmly into the light sweltering and pulsing like a panicked heart in the Hollow Knight’s empty eyes, bright as staring into the sun where there should have been deepest black of night. To that, the Hollow Knight responded at last, and they had only agony to share. And share they did, deafening and so hard to bear, and impossible to turn away from. Ghost told the Hollow Knight their name, though the Hollow Knight’s own thoughts were blinding and blistering pain that, when they contacted Ghost’s, scorched and cut through until they, too, felt a mirror of their agony. Still Ghost remained.

Ghost dropped their nail to the floor and didn’t hear it clatter there, useless, and used the freed hand to hold the other side of the Hollow Knight’s face as well as their sibling twitched helplessly, violently straining once more against Hornet’s silk that held fast even as it faded.

It’s alright, Ghost said and gently reached intact mind and untainted void into the Hollow Knight, touching what little void was left there with the greater understanding they had of their own. Let me help, they said and carefully, delicately prised free the bindings and the rigid, reflexive hold on the very origin of that infectious sickness and unbearable light the Hollow Knight kept, in the way one electrocuted finds their hands clenched unrelenting-tight. For you, they said and wrapped their own around it, slowly blistering against the golden, virulent anger, holes wearing through and just as quickly flooded by unlit void. You, they said, and their voice failed them even here as with a shivering jolt the Radiance was pulled free and consumed.

The Hollow Knight collapsed, hollowed and empty, carved away inside by the light until their mind, always, always hurting, could not respond to the sudden loss of their burden. They fell limp with a weight Ghost felt the force of where it shook the floor, and would have fallen farther if not for the binding threads about them.

Ghost understood with absolute empathy, feeling the Radiance begin to carve away at them, too. Given enough time she would hollow them out, make their edges thin like dawn shadows and their center, which was meant to be always void condensed, brilliant and shining like the knife-edge of broken glass before the sun.

But there were no pale seals anymore, no wyrm-magic to hold and to isolate. And Ghost knew better than to think themself alone. And so Ghost felt the reach of the void much deeper than theirs and, with the Light burning them away, reached back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLD TIGHT THE HOLLOW KNIGHT/PUT IT IN A BOX/KEEP IT THERE FOR FIFTY YEARS/THEN SEE IF IT TALKS!
> 
> I've literally been sitting on that joke for, what, three months?
> 
> But here we are, second to last chapter. And then we're done, theoretically. I bet y'all were wondering what was going to be done without the Dream Nail, considering that would regularly lock us into the very worst (?) endings. Well, the answer is that this is an AU and as much as I love the Radiance, this isn't /about/ her.


	32. To Sing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A home is saved, and a sibling greeted. 
> 
> Chapter Warnings : Very vague suicidal ideation, minor post-Infection body horror (not a patch on before, honestly), angst, reunion

The Radiance had a song, and she sang of love.

Gods did not easily forget, nor did they easily cede anything they considered their own, and the Radiance was a god of dreams of times past, and of the reaching, encompassing light of day.

So the Radiance sang of her people and longing and corruption, and of anguish. And, for an age, she had sung her vengeance, merciless and absolute, into being. Her voice was not a single note, but countless like the flutter of delicate wings, and burning like the unwavering attention of close stars. And her song was blind, for the Radiance was blinded. It inspired rage, for the Radiance raged. It obsessed, for there was little the Radiance thought of but what she had lost.

There is little more frightening than unforgivable crimes done in love’s name, without thought for consequence and emboldened by the urging of the heart.

And the Radiance loved so fervently, as Ghost heard in her voice as they struggled against her, finally vulnerable to the madness she inspired, and she loved so enduringly.

Those who had been hers had forgotten her, but she had not forgotten them. In their name, any cost was worthwhile. In their name she brought low a civilization by the sheer constancy of her song, flowing everlasting and, like a stream, fed by care for those who were long gone.

So for ages past the Radiance had sung, and her song had very nearly destroyed the Hollow Knight right alongside everything they sought to protect, out of their own love.

But there existed something the Radiance could not sing to, that even her heartfelt, raging song could not incite from consummate stillness, and nothing ever would.

For songs of the Void were not songs at all.

The Void was a very honest thing.

It was the quiet. The dark. Isolation and regret given unknowable form. It collected at the basin of the world, trickled so minutely as to be unnoticeable. The Void was not something to be quantified by measures so meaningless as volume or time. How does one count that which is not there, how does one describe a darkened room? It could contain everything, or nothing.

As it happened, the Void Sea contained everything, in a sense. It was to the touch as thin as air, without physical presence, unless one also happened to be made of void. It did not need to be tangible to be immutable. But some shadows are deeper than others, and the Void Sea was the deepest shadow of all. The essence, distilled and concentrated, of the regrets of all Hallownest across all time, and everything before that, and everything around it.

All would become void in the end. It was all the danger of a fathomless, shoreless lake to a faltering songbird, the Void lying below Hallownest, and yet it was equaled in power by its quiet placidity, like that of death. The Void would never seek revenge, or conquest, or awareness.

The Void had no direction. But Soul is born of heartfelt wishes and struggle.

And a being of Void and Soul with the will to animate the sheer vast nothing can swallow gods.

The Void was, when it came down to the wire, inseparable. Ghost knew this innately, ever since they’d given themself over to it and felt firsthand its pain and unity, and it didn’t seem strange. Their void was small and confined, but a much greater one was, to their perspective, immediately at hand. Their void was a drop in the bucket, could not hope to constrain even such a weak and forgotten and long-fighting god as the Radiance. She would burn the shadows out of them, and then consume their light, and then she would be free.

So they shunted her underneath the whole crushing force of the Void Sea, beneath which the Radiance could burn and burn until Hallownest crumbled to dust and the mountains fell and rose again, and never break the surface.

And Ghost was cold once more, the enkindled god’s lashing, conflagrant wrath gone. Their void rushed back to fill in the gap, then at their urging fed the tenuous, hungry void that remained spread so thinly within the Hollow Knight.

There, Ghost softly said to the Hollow Knight’s sleeping mind, aching and dazed, I told you I would be back.

Even burned back and cauterized so thoroughly, at Ghost’s careful stream of given void the Hollow Knight drew faintly closer, and the gaping, immense wound deep within their chest began to fill in.

Ghost felt them sigh from the depths of their tormented soul and, as Ghost fed them trickles and drops of void to remake themself with, the Hollow Knight flickered truly awake for the first time since Hallownest’s fall.

The final seals enshrouding the Black Egg, which Ghost thought must have been responsible for the collected void that sustained the Hollow Knight all these years, snapped like aged, gossamer bones, and then the void heavy in the air began to descend, filtering through the unseeable cracks in the floor to drip down, implacably, to join the Sea. Ghost was glad for its loss as they cleaved through a strand of dissipating silk, unraveling all the rest all at once and sending the Hollow Knight crashing to the floor, too heavy even for Ghost to support.

They did their level best, and managed to prevent the Hollow Knight’s mask from cracking against the stone even as the weight of it and the awkward angle might have crushed their hands had they been even an ounce weaker. Ghost settled the Hollow Knight’s mask, as much as they could, over their folded legs and looked around with sudden, piercing concern for Hornet.

The only void here was their own and the Hollow Knight’s, now, but where had she gone?

Not far, as it turned out, and though the sight of her sprawled where she’d fallen with her mask angled awkwardly back and her needle far from her hand had Ghost rigid with horror, the moment they shook off enough of it to look her over without the haze of panic they saw she was breathing, deeply and regularly. Even so, they set the Hollow Knight’s head gently down with exacting care, mindful of the deep, painful crack cutting from one eye across their forehead, and stumbled to her side.

Hornet was unharmed, as well as Ghost could determine. She was only unconscious, her mask intact and her limbs unbloodied, her carapace rough and shawl torn in places from impacting the stone but uncracked and whole. They wanted to shake her awake to be sure she was alright, but what little they knew about bugs and concussions warned them not to disturb her too badly.

But it abraded at them to have either insensate sibling out of sight at all, the awareness that Ghost was their only protection and that the way into the Black Egg stood open and unsealed crawling up their back whenever they faced away from the door, years and years of engrained, if scarcely remembered, experience warning them never to leave an exit unguarded. Ghost was fairly sure they hadn’t a lumafly’s chance in Void of moving the Hollow Knight anywhere without help, so instead they would have to move Hornet.

This proved only slightly more realistic as, unconscious, Hornet somehow weighed infinitely more than they’d have guessed, and was infinitely less graceful than when she was awake. It took doing, but they draped her proud, surprisingly difficult-to-maneuver horns over their shoulder and bodily hauled her closer to where the Hollow Knight lay. Ghost situated her on her side, as comfortably as possible, and then went back for her needle.

Then Ghost sat themself down and drew the Hollow Knight’s wounded head back into their lap, sitting between their siblings and the door with their own nail lying at their side, angled just so that they might see both and the open path, gone still and dimming as the Infection shriveled and died around them, at the same glance. All was still and quiet, quieter than they’d ever heard the Crossroads to be, but not the weighty silence of void. It was more peaceful than that. Restful.

Ghost looked away from the unbarred door, dark and empty, with reluctance to run a wondering, feather-light hand over the Hollow Knight’s cracked mask and finally, finally look at them. The desire to know what the Sibling had grown into, how they’d changed in all the time they’d been away, was something they couldn’t beat down as the soundless, waiting peace dragged on. Could it be a calm after the storm? Could they dare to hope for it?

And oh, how they’d changed. The Hollow Knight’s mask, once of a size with Ghost’s and, they remembered, round and pale like their own, was now an unhealthy off-white cast and fragile to even their delicate touch. It had grown immensely, become pointed and imposing, several times as tall as Ghost’s entire body. The dull surface was darkened with dust and crusted in the thin remnants of the Radiance’s plague. The crack, where the Radiance must have come so close to shattering them utterly, was caked in the orange mess dimming slowly in the scant light of the flickering, broken wyrm-seals, as were the curves of their empty eyes and chin.

The Hollow Knight looked awful, sick and listless as their head lolled bonelessly on Ghost’s lap.

Ghost felt their void conflicted, awed and angered and hesitant to settle on a single emotion as their sibling lay insensate before them, splayed, broken over the filthy stone floor, head only pillowed by Ghost’s small lap. Dearly they’d known what the Hollow Knight had felt in the final days carrying the Infection, but as the moments passed in the quiet Ghost was beginning to comprehend the vast timeframe it had built from, to weaken their mask so thoroughly, to make them, a being of void more than flesh and chitin, so frighteningly weak.

But it was over now, the worst, at least. They were safe, and Ghost would rather face their same fate than allow anything like it to happen again.

Ghost tested the solidity of the Hollow Knight’s void to focus on anything but that and found it tumultuous and twitching within their carapace as though pained, but in no danger of leaking away and sufficient, as far as they could tell, to comfortably sustain their form. However changed Ghost’s void might have been by now, to give so much of it was still an incredible drain that left Ghost exhausted and hungry and feeling like they’d actually taken a few hits from their sibling’s great nail.

They didn’t particularly care. Ghost wished they could have held the Sibling’s hand again much more fervently than for soul to take away the ache.

It wasn’t much longer into Ghost’s tense vigil until the Hollow Knight gave a slow, shuddering flinch and, as Ghost watched them with observant anticipation, spoke. It was low, rolling and jumbled like waves over swirling sand, and underscored with empty pain.

Notalonepleaseconfused pleasehurtspleasestop, the Hollow Knight begged, half-conscious, quiet and gaining intensity. Sorrysorrysorrybrighttoobrightburning.

Ghost hurriedly pressed their forehead to the Hollow Knight’s, gentle and warmly, endlessly calm. Don’t worry, they told the desperate, half-conscious Vessel, painfully aware that they needed reassurance more than reunion. You have done so well. The Light is far from here, far from you.

BurnsburnssiblingsorrylightwhereislightNO! The Hollow Knight screamed into Ghost’s mind and they felt the Hollow Knight’s wrenching, white-hot shame rising hot and juddering in their throat, their _horror_ to properly realize that the Radiance was gone, and only knowing one way she could have escaped.

FAILURE, the Hollow Knight howled, and they physically managed, somehow, a thin whistling gasp. Had they been able, Ghost knew they would have clawed ruts into the hard stone floor with disintegrating fingers to get to their feet, shattered their own faltering, cracking legs to give chase and try until their efforts killed them to take up their burden again. Ghost themself jerked their head away and nearly jumped up, for a moment overwhelmed by the urgency and the fanatical fear, something they never would have anticipated from the ever-steady Sibling.

But that wasn’t true, was it? And now it was Ghost’s turn to be calm where the Hollow Knight couldn’t.

Ghost braced themself against the consuming, blindingly panicked force of their sibling’s despair and patted shaking claws against the Hollow Knight’s mask, jerking weakly side to side as their single remaining arm clawed weakly into the crevices of the stone they lay upon, too exhausted even to fold properly.

No, no, Ghost tried to impress calm over the Hollow Knight’s frantic void, subduing its lashing with careful reach of their own and fearful that, so recently stable, it would shake itself loose of their carapace, which still seemed so hazardously thin. The Radiance is captive still, they reassured.

The Hollow Knight turned their shrieking panic at Ghost then. WHERE? WITHYOU? They demanded.

Yes, Ghost replied strongly enough that the Hollow Knight stilled. And no. The Radiance is pinned beneath all Void of Hallownest, and will never be free. She is gone and you are safe, because I guard her now. It isn’t your burden anymore, Ghost insisted and showed the Hollow Knight their own certainty, led them to the Sea and let them see how deeply she was buried, like a lone star far away amongst the endless, faultless night.

The Hollow Knight surveyed it from every angle they could think to, which wasn’t many among the endless possible in that dense and shadowed place, and finally calmed into speechless uncertainty. They turned their attention again to Ghost, who softly, feebly nudged their mask against theirs again, careful of the cracks and heedless of the lingering rot.

You’ve been here for a long time, Sibling, Ghost told them, not unkindly. Do you remember me?

No, the Hollow Knight said, for they didn’t, not then, not immediately. Ghost knew their memories of the better and worse times before the Radiance had been coated and buried deep by her anger and the long, painful years, all except the single stalwart understanding of their purpose they had held onto as tightly as they had the Radiance herself. If filled Ghost with bittersweet pride, to see the Hollow Knight’s tenacity was still uncowed.

And it hurt, to care so much and be forgotten, but Ghost was not surprised, and they found they didn’t mind. Not when it was all over now, and their sibling was safe and by their side again.

The Hollow Knight was silent for a long time, feeling the festering gap in their chest where the slickly infectious Light had swelled slowly to fill the burned-out holes of them that never should have been, aware of the void not wholly their own now falteringly rising to fill out the breaches in its place. Ghost let them take their time, settling in to be present as long as the Hollow Knight needed and taking their own, different reassurance to see their wounds begin to heal.

No, the Hollow Knight protested suddenly, not unloved. Familiar. Wonderful, calm. Kind. So hopeful. Cold where she burned. Important, the Hollow Knight whispered, more important than anything. Knew you before?

Yes, Ghost breathed, hope a tiny, stubborn knot in their chest. You knew me. You were calm and strong and kind for me, a long time ago. I will never truly forget.

Oh, the Hollow Knight said, and Ghost felt that they were at a loss. I am none of that now, they told Ghost. I’m not sure I am anything at all.

Yes, you are, Ghost insisted. And I have so much to show you. All that is left of Hallownest is left only because of you. It’s beautiful, Sibling.

The Hollow Knight gazed up into their mask with empty black eyes, encrusted with Infection that had become a dull, lifeless brown.

My body is heavy and so is my soul, they whispered. And I have failed in every way. I have never slept, but I want to now.

The Hollow Knight’s fingers twitched as though they would have done something with them, had they not been exhausted to the point of immobility.

But you would never do that, would you? The Hollow Knight’s voice came tentative and slow, like they were reminding themself of something half-remembered. They tilted their head, or Ghost thought they might have, for all the Hollow Knight actually did was shift its burden some, weary eyes boring into Ghost’s with sudden intensity that even so was through a haze of exhaustion. Something had changed, their mind suddenly focused and clear.

What is your name? The Hollow Knight asked. Their voice was so quiet, but they spoke like the answer would be the final piece of something they’d lost a long time since. Like they knew Ghost’s answer by heart, but couldn’t quite recall the words.

Ghost rubbed a streak of Infection, cooled to rot-warm, from the Hollow Knight’s mask with an unsteady hand, and answered as honestly as they could.

I am the Knight, they replied. And that means I am loyal, and brave, and I will never lose hope.

The Hollow Knight nuzzled into Ghost’s embrace with just a faint increase of the weight of their mask. It does, they agreed, of course it does. Curious wanderer-Knight. I’m so sorry I let you fall.

Ghost sobbed and head-butted them weakly, even so drawing a stifled flinch from the Hollow Knight who, regardless, strained to raise their heavy head and nudge back.

Ghost’s tears dripped fast down their face and onto the Hollow Knight’s, staining the already stained mask dark, and through them they saw the Hollow Knight’s own tears make indistinguishable dark lines down the pale and fall onto Ghost’s tattered cloak. There was so much to say, so much to _tell_ them, so much to ask and to fuss over and Ghost knew, they _knew_ that they’d have all the time in the world for it.

For now Ghost put aside their fear and worry and the heavy burden of the long years, and the Hollow Knight let their shame and regret and the indelible, glaring marks those same years had left on them be soothed, just for the moment, and it was like they had never been parted in that Ghost knew they’d always have the other to be strong for, to carry on even with the weight of everything in the name of and to make the load bearable, always.

I have you back, Ghost tearfully laughed, and it was all worth it.

I could say the same, the Hollow Knight replied, their voice so quiet and stopping and starting like they were afraid it would be heard, but each word told like there was nothing else to do but say it.

But I expect you’d have something to say about that, the Hollow Knight guessed, and Ghost could hear amazement in their unpracticed words, as though to hear Ghost’s response was too incredible to be true.

Not as much as you’d think, Ghost told them, and nothing that can’t wait. Rest.

The Hollow Knight did not rest, instead falling silent and, with an immense, herculean effort, scraping their arm along the stone to lay their hand, open palm-up, beside their face and within reach of Ghost’s own. The simple effort had their long, Infection-encrusted fingers trembling, and Ghost could faintly feel the Hollow Knight’s void curl woozily as their consciousness flickered.

But Ghost couldn’t berate them, not when they were so tired and the damage already done. Not once they realized it was an offer, a far gentler one than they’d known, and a request.

You’ve never been quiet with your thoughts, Knight, the Hollow Knight said, and offered Ghost their hand.

Ghost laughed at them, tremulously, wonderingly, and gripped one of the Hollow Knight’s stained claws in their own.

Missed you, the Hollow Knight murmured sleepily. And with that they gave a deep, contented sigh that resonated like a long, sustained note through their void, making fresh tears fall from Ghost’s mask for the sheer joy of hearing them again, and slowly, falteringly lost the battle to stay aware, drifting into rest at last.

High above them the wind slowed by fractions, lessening until it stood still and, above even that, the night sky lightened by hesitant, slow degrees. Dawn came at last, but it was only the return of the sun.

Beside them, Hornet began to stir.

And all was well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So here we have it. The end of our story.
> 
> I'm satisfied with it narrative-wise; it's the end of Ghost's tale as it plays out differently from the canonical events, starting at the same beginning and meeting at the same endpoint, with a few alterations. But I don't know how satisfied I am with the purpose it was supposed to serve; giving these damned bugs a happy ending. I mean, it's happy, everyone is alive and (going to be) well and all there's left to do is to go appropriate a house in Dirtmouth and help with the aftermath. 
> 
> But is it truly a /happy ending/? I talk a big talk with angst and all, but I'm a huge softy for truly happy endings, however hard they are for me to write. There's a 50/50 chance I'll write some sort of epilogue that I like enough to add on. But in the chance that I don't,
> 
> Past this lies the hope Ghost has built, nourished and grown by the people they've saved and the care they'd taken. No one can truly do anything alone, and now there's time to forge ahead together and find the work meaningful instead of grueling. It'll be rough, but they'll be alright. That's the point of this fic, after all.


End file.
